An enhancement of our Control360 platform will give bus operators a more joined-up view of vehicle availability.
Earlier this year, the company expanded once again with the acquisition of ASC Software. Already well established in the road haulage sector, Assetminder covers the complete maintenance lifecycle, including planned maintenance, defect management, inspections, workshop activity, stock control and asset costs.
For bus operators, the opportunity is to connect that engineering intelligence with the day-to-day decisions that determine whether services leave the depot as planned.
Bringing engineering and operations together
Control360 was created to unify operational data from across bus operations, giving control teams a single view rather than forcing them to move between disconnected systems.
Integrating Assetminder adds a significant new dimension: real-time information about fleet condition and availability.
Nick Brookes, Chief Customer Officer at Velociti Solutions, explains:
“A bus operation can have the right drivers and the right schedules in place, but none of that matters if the right vehicles are not available. Assetminder gives us the opportunity to bring engineering much closer to the operational picture and make vehicle availability part of that joined-up decision-making process.”
Assetminder integrates directly with Velociti’s Depot Allocation System (DAS) platform, providing updates on which vehicles are available for allocation, which are off-road and which cannot be allocated.
Allocation decisions can therefore reflect the latest engineering status, reducing last-minute vehicle changes and helping to improve service quality.
“Operations and engineering are completely dependent on each other, but the systems they use have traditionally been separate,” adds Nick. “By connecting Assetminder and Control360, we can help those teams work from the same information and in far greater harmony.”
From defect to decision
Assetminder goes far beyond recording whether a vehicle is available. Its workshop management capabilities track time, parts and other costs through job cards, while defect management provides a full audit trail.
Driver inspections can feed defects directly into maintenance workflows, automatically generating job cards that can then be managed efficiently through to completion.
Crucially, that workshop information can have an immediate impact on service delivery. If a defect takes a bus off the road, its status can flow through to the systems responsible for allocation and control. Once the vehicle becomes available again, those teams can see the change without relying on separate manual updates.
This reduces the risk of delayed or inconsistent information passing between departments and helps teams make decisions using the latest available data.
More proactive fleet management
Assetminder also enables a more active approach to fleet management. Live dashboards provide visibility of fleet status and outstanding inspections, while planned maintenance and detailed asset histories can help engineering teams manage work before it affects service delivery.
Its mobile capabilities also allow technicians to create job cards remotely and synchronise information back into the central system.
“Control360 has always been about turning fragmented, disparate information flows into something operators can act on,” says Nick. “Assetminder plugs an important gap. We can now connect what is happening in the workshop with what is happening in the control room, helping operators anticipate constraints rather than discover them when a vehicle is needed.”
A more complete Control360
Assetminder is already a highly regarded solution in the freight and logistics sector, and Nick believes its wider introduction to the bus industry offers a considerable opportunity.
Its proven fleet maintenance capabilities add another piece to the Control360 proposition, widening its reach beyond service control and into the engineering functions which underpin reliable day-to-day operations.
“The goal is simple: fewer surprises, better coordination and more well-informed decisions,” he adds. “Bringing Assetminder into Control360 helps us connect engineering and operations in a way that can make a clear difference to the reliability, efficiency and the day-to-day running of bus networks.”
