The trouble is, most services available that track fleets tend to only track a crew’s truck and not all the individual pieces of equipment on the trailer.
Enter Tenna, a cloud-based solution that can manage every type of equipment all on one platform. The company was founded in 2015 and was born out of the construction industry’s need to track and know where every asset is, from heavy equipment to handheld tools.
Now, it has expanded to cater to other industries, including landscaping.
Unlike other fleet tracking services which merely offer GPS tracking, Tenna’s service is more on the telematics level.
“For productivity purposes or theft purposes, telematics is really studying and getting insights on the performance of that machine, which gives you more insights into the maintenance required, the usage of it in the field, the level of productivity and a couple of other key operating metrics beyond where is that piece,” says Jose Cueva, co-founder.
Cueva says that as more businesses adopt mobile devices as simply another tool in the workplace, more are looking to take that technology to the next level.
“We’re seeing a lot of interest in them leveraging the tools that they have and managing things from the field first, which is new, as opposed to managing things centrally from their main office,” he says.
Cueva says that Tenna allows landscapers to track and monitor the location and performance of all their equipment, both large and small, through its various devices.
“Our biggest differentiator is that we paint the full picture in one place without having to leave gaps or compromise,” he says.
“It’s incredibly easy; you usually just scan a barcode or a QR code and you select the asset you want to link it to, and from there on forward, they’re permanently linked,” Cueva says.
One of the newest trackers is the TennaGo tracker, which is a product line of rugged GPS real-time trackers that are either can either plug in to a machine or run off a battery.
“The units are cost effective,” he says. “They’re rugged and the software with that unit in the field delivers insights that business owners are looking for.”
Tenna helps landscaping companies to minimize idling time and optimize routes through the data it provides. Cueva says that ease-of-use, competitive pricing and dedicated hardware are some of the reasons that landscapers cite for using Tenna.
“Our pricing is tailored to the exact needs of all of our customers so it’s based on the number of assets that they have and the type of solutions that they want to pursue, always guaranteeing that they’re going to get the highest return on investments for their specific make and breakdown of their fleet, so we can accommodate to pretty much any size or variety,” he says.
Aside from tracking and improving productivity, Tenna can also help reduce theft with features like geofencing.
“Knowing what you have is the first step toward minimizing theft,” Cueva says. “It’s incredible the amount of business owners that when we get them set up are surprised at finding additional tools or additional assets that they didn’t know they still had in their fleet.”
While manufacturers like Briggs & Stratton and Husqvarna have started to introduce their own fleet trackers for equipment through InfoHub and Fleet Services, Cueva doesn’t feel threatened by them, but rather sees them as potential partners.
“These brands of manufacturers are primarily pushing those solutions through their brand and through their products, so being a completely independent solutions provider allows us be in between where we could partner up with them and enable pieces of their solution that they’re looking for or missing without them having to distract themselves from their true revenue source, which is the sale of the pieces of equipment,” Cueva says.
As for the future, Tenna says it’s dedicated to innovating and bringing new products into the market that fit into the goal of tracking all assets in one place.
“What that means for business owners is more options and more fitting technologies for different pieces of their business that they eventually want to be able to optimize,” he says.
