After building the fleet management system for CAR2GO, Daimler approached RPC to design and build a similar system for autonomous vehicles. This was initially an MVP that was the baseline for Daimler’s Research and Development teams in Germany. The project was initially based on brand new technology that had not yet been field tested and the RPC team oversaw the process from prototype to fleet-wide release and support. Daimler uses Mercedes-Benz vehicles and features one-way point-to-point rentals using driverless vehicles.

Apart from the general fleet management system, project control at Daimler needed to be able to understand all the variables that affect traffic patterns (city events, weather conditions, wrecks, etc.). By creating demand forecasting algorithms, the system was able to better understand how to send the vehicles to locations where they’d most likely be used. RPC project leaders integrated with several other Daimler teams all over the world to bring this technology to life. Our team of experts worked with them to understand their vision and produced a product roadmap as a reference for all future development. We followed a technology stack that our team had used on previous projects and which fit into Daimler’s technology ecosystem. After 10 months, we had our MVP up and running and started successfully testing with autonomous vehicles

Results:

• Successful autonomous vehicle pick up and drop off of customers
• Deployment of first iteration of autonomous vehicle fleet management system
• Real-time data at a glance ensuring best business decisions can be made
• Use in-house and industry data to predict customer demand and future fleet distribution
• Use real-time fleet management analytics to improve routing, fleet allocation, more efficient utilization, and lower costs
• Leverage optimization techniques to better solve complex planning and scheduling problems
• Each market can individually customize their data interactions with the system
• Deployed a data migration strategy to make standalone services autonomous
• Daimler can now update, support, and enhance individual services, faster
• Developers, architects, and business leaders recognize the value that microservices can bring to the organization

Why RightPlace

Expertise:

Daimler approached RightPlace for their expertise with web based applications and proven track record to deliver successful projects. RPC’s highest goal is to establish long-term partnerships with our clients, and our successful work for their subsidiary Car2Go resulted in a request to assist with this larger rollout. We’re proud of our successes in implementing real time, data analytics-based solutions for transportation companies - and we’re always interested in helping to create solutions to fleet management and logistical problems.

Customer First Model:

As with the beginning of every new relationship, we are relentless on customer intimacy, learning all the details of the customer’s current state and to become acutely aware of business process. This made RPC the right choice to deliver on new business initiatives and become a long term strategic partner.

Technology Choice:

Here at RPC, we know there are many different technology choices out there and choosing from the vast number of tech stack choices available can be difficult. We are confident in our ability to deliver quality results across a wide range of technologies. We will not stop until we’ve identified the elements that are the best fit for your needs. We excel at helping companies educate themselves on their options and giving expert advice on strategic decisions whenever needed.