Vigillo LLC, creators of data mining software products designed to aggregate, organize and deliver complex fleet safety information in an easy-to-read scorecard format, announced December 4 during the American Trucking Associations (ATA) Executive Summit on Technology-Driven Performance its new Athena Big Data Business Intelligence platform.
Named for the Greek goddess of wisdom, Athena is an open source Big Data solution that gathers data from a wide variety of sources, distills it into understandable information and then presents it in a straightforward format that trucking companies can use to improve a range of operational factors. The web-based solution is accessible through all types of devices and provides data-visualization through interactive dashboards and a report deployment scheduler.
“Big Data is a four step process…Acquire, Analyze, Visualize and Publish,” said Steve Bryan, Vigillo chief executive officer. “Eighty percent of data projects fail at step one but with our years of experience gathering and working with CSA information, we understand where valuable data can be found. Getting data that isn’t designed to be found and presenting it in an easy to use and meaningful format is where we excel.”
The initial Athena platform will launch with 12 basic channels focused primarily on trucking safety, efficiency and profitability, with the majority of data coming from public sources.
“We will continue to gather information from FMCSA, DOT and the standard locations we’ve been using for CSA information,” Bryan said. “However, with Athena we’re taking it one step further and not just looking at CSA but at all things related to trucking. We’re looking at US population statistics, GDP, weather, traffic, highway infrastructure investments, tolls, and more. Our goal is to intelligently answer the question ‘why’ and deliver that answer to anyone, anywhere, any time and in a way they can understand, whether it’s the CFO or safety manager, shipper, driver or insurer. Athena is designed to pull all of trucking’s data into one platform and then publish that wisdom on demand.”
In addition to gathering data from public sources, Vigillo will be working with other industry data sources, such as legal, training and onboard system providers, to capture relevant data from a wide variety of integrated channels, and join them in a cohesive Business Intelligence environment. Initial reports will be presented in a set of about 30 highly customizable dashboards for effectively managing safety, operations, sales, maintenance, fuel purchasing, and driver recruiting and retention, among others.