Method and System for Providing Supplemental Services to Telematics Systems

• US 20090287369A1
• Filed: 05/01/2009
• Published: 11/19/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 05/02/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: GE Global Sourcing LLC (Westinghouse Air Brake Technologies Corporation)
• Original Assignee: General Electric Company
• Inventors: Nielsen, Benjamin Jason
• Granted Patent: US 8,301,330 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 701/33
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/08 Logistics, e.g. warehousing, loading or distribution; Inventory or stock management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0833 Tracking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/00 Commerce
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/008 communicating information to a remotely located station transmission systems for measured values G08C
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 1/20 Monitoring the location of vehicles belonging to a group, e.g. fleet of vehicles, countable or determined number of vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/52 specially adapted for the location of the user terminal
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/02 Services making use of location information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/027 using movement velocity, acceleration information
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 4/029 Location-based management or tracking services

Abstract

The embodiments of the present innovation provide a method and system for providing supplemental services to telematics systems. The method and system receives data from a telematics provider in a non-proprietary format, parses the data, stores the data, provides the data to a third party application, obtains an output from the third party application, and transmits the output to a customer. The method and system may also receive data from any portable device, parse the data, store the data, provide the data to a third party application, obtain an output from the third party application, and transmit the output to a customer.

Claims

1. A method for providing supplemental services to a customer of an existing telematics system managed by an existing telematics provider comprising:

receiving from the existing telematics provider location and diagnostics data relating to at least one asset owned by the customer, in a non-proprietary format;

parsing said location and diagnostics data;

storing said location and diagnostics data;

providing select location and diagnostics data to a third party application;

obtaining an output from said third party application based on the select location and diagnostics data provided to the third party application;

transmitting the output of said third party application such that said output is available to said customer, said output representing supplemental services to the customer.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising

obtaining additional data needed for said supplemental services, parsing the additional data, and storing the additional data;

providing select additional data to a third party application in addition to providing said select location and diagnostics data;

wherein said output from said third party application is based on select additional data in addition to said select location and diagnostics data.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein providing select location and diagnostics data to a third party application further comprises checking a routing table for a data format usable by said third party application and reformatting the select location and diagnostics data into the data format usable by said third party application.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein providing select location and diagnostics data to a third party application further comprises at least one of:

selecting the location and diagnostics data to provide based on information stored in a routing table;

transmitting said select data to a remote location where said third party application resides;

providing the location and diagnostics data at time intervals based on information stored in a routing table;

or

providing the location and diagnostics data in a file format based on information stored in a routing table.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein transmitting the output of said third party application such that said output is available to said customer comprises at least one of

transmitting the output to the existing telematics provider;

making the output available to the customer via an internet-based user interface;

or

transmitting an output file to said customer.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein said third party application determines at least one of:

the status of modifiable use conditions related to safety and wherein said output is a statistical metric of the relatively safety of an asset or fleet;

modifiable use conditions related to fuel economy and wherein said output is a statistical metric of the relatively fuel economy of an asset or fleet;

a performance indicator for an asset or fleet of assets and wherein said output is an actionable metric that affects the performance indicator;

the status of undesired vehicle events and wherein said output is a statistical metric of the undesired vehicle events of an asset or fleet;

the optimal routing of vehicles in a fleet and wherein said output are directions showing the optimal routing of the vehicles in the fleet;

or

an optimal schedule of service stops for a vehicle or fleet of vehicles and wherein said output is a schedule of service stops for a vehicle or fleet of vehicles.

7. A system for providing supplemental services to a customer of an existing telematics system managed by an existing telematics provider comprising:

an application programming interface for receiving from the existing telematics provider location and diagnostics data relating to at least one asset owned by the customer, in a non-proprietary format;

a parser for parsing said location and diagnostics data;

a data warehouse for storing said location and diagnostics data;

a third party application for processing select location and diagnostics data transmitted by said application programming interface to said third party application, said third party application providing an output based on the select location and diagnostics data provided to the third party application;

wherein the output of said third party application is made available to said customer, said output representing supplemental services to the customer.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein

said application programming interface receives additional data needed for said supplemental services, said parser parses the additional data, and said data warehouse stores the additional data;

said third party application processes select additional data in addition to processing said select location and diagnostics data and provides an output based on the select additional data in addition to the select location and diagnostics data;

9. The system of claim 7, wherein said application programming interface causes a routing table to be checked to determine a format usable by said third party application, and wherein said application programming interface causes reformatting of said select location and diagnostics data into the data format usable by said third party application before said application programming interface causes transmitting of said select location and diagnostics data to said third party application.

10. The system of claim 7, wherein said application programming interface causes the transmission of select location and diagnostics data to a remotely located third party application and wherein said application programming interface causes a routing table to be checked to determine at least one of the following:

which location and diagnostics data to send to a third party application, which select location and diagnostics data to send to a third party application, or a file format in which select location and diagnostics data should be sent to a third party application.

11. The system of claim 7, wherein said application programming interface causes the output of said third party application to be transmitted at least one of said existing telematics provider, said customer via an internet-based user interface, or to said customer in an output file.

12. A method for providing supplemental services to a customer of an existing telematics system managed by an existing telematics provider comprising:

receiving data from a portable device located on an asset owned by the customer;

parsing said data;

storing said data;

providing select data to a third party application;

obtaining an output from said third party application based on the select data provided to the third party application;

transmitting the output of said third party application such that said output is available to said customer, said output representing supplemental services to the customer.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein said data received from said portable device is in a proprietary format and further comprising reformatting said data in a proprietary format received from said portable device to data in a non-proprietary format before storing said data.

14. The method of claim 12, further comprising checking a routing table for the data format usable by said third party application and wherein said data received from said portable device is reformatted into a form usable by said third party application before said data is provided to said third party application.

15. The method of claim 12, wherein transmitting the output of said third party application to the customer comprises transmitting the output to the existing telematics provider, making the output available to the customer via an internet-based user interface, transmitting an output file to said customer, or transmitting an output file to said portable device, and wherein transmitting an output file to said customer or said portable device comprises checking a routing table for a data format usable by said customer or said portable device and reformatting said output to a format usable by said customer or said portable device before transmitting said output file.

16. The method of claim 12, further comprising:

obtaining additional data needed for said supplemental services, parsing the additional data, and storing the additional data;

providing select additional data to a third party application in addition to providing said select data;

wherein said output from said third party application is based on select additional data in addition to said select data.

17. The method of claim 12, further comprising

receiving from the existing telematics provider location and diagnostics data relating to at least one asset owned by the customer, parsing the location and diagnostics data, and storing the location and diagnostics data;

providing select location and diagnostics data to a third party application in addition to providing said select data.

18. The method of claim 12, further comprising

receiving from the existing telematics provider location and diagnostics data relating to at least one asset owned by the customer, parsing the location and diagnostics data, and storing the location and diagnostics data;

providing select location and diagnostics data to a third party application in addition to providing said select data and select additional data;

wherein said output from said third party application is based on select location and diagnostics data in addition to said select data and said select additional data.

19. The method of claim 12, wherein said third party application determines at least one of:

the status of modifiable use conditions related to safety and wherein said output is a statistical metric of the relatively safety of an asset or fleet;

the status of modifiable use conditions related to fuel economy and wherein said output is a statistical metric of the relatively fuel economy of an asset or fleet;

a performance indicator for an asset or fleet of assets and wherein said output is an actionable metric that affects the performance indicator;

the status of undesired vehicle events and wherein said output is a statistical metric of the undesired vehicle events of an asset or fleet;

the optimal routing of vehicles in a fleet and wherein said output are directions showing the optimal routing of the vehicles in the fleet, or

an optimal schedule of service stops for a vehicle or fleet of vehicles and wherein said output is a schedule of service stops for a vehicle or fleet of vehicles.

20. A system for providing supplemental services to a customer of an existing telematics system managed by an existing telematics provider comprising:

an application programming interface for receiving data from portable devices located on an asset owned by the customer;

a parser for parsing said data;

a data warehouse for storing said data;

a third party application for processing select data caused to be transmitted by said application programming interface to said third party application, said third party application providing an output based on the select location and diagnostics data provided to the third party application;

wherein the output of said third party application is made available to said customer, said output representing supplemental services to the customer.

21. The system of claim 20, wherein said data received from said portable device is in a proprietary format, and further comprising said application processing interface causing reformatting of said data in a proprietary format received from said portable device to data in a non-proprietary format before storing said data.

22. The system of claim 20, wherein said application processing interface causes a routing table to be checked for a data format usable by said third party application and wherein said application processing interface causes reformatting of said data received from said portable device into a form usable by said third party application before said data is provided to said third party application.

23. The system of claim 20, wherein making available to said customer said output of said third party application comprises transmitting the output to the existing telematics provider, making the output available to the customer via an internet-based user interface, transmitting an output file to said customer, or transmitting an output file to said portable device, and

wherein transmitting an output file to said customer or said portable device comprises checking a routing table for a data format usable by said customer or said portable device and reformatting said output to a format usable by said customer or said portable device before transmitting said output file.

24. The system of claim 20, further comprising:

receiving at said application processing interface additional data needed for said supplemental services, said parser parsing the additional data, and storing the additional data in said datawarehouse;

said application processing interface causing select additional data to be provided to a third party application in addition to causing said select data to be provided to said third party application;

wherein said third party application provides an output based on select additional data in addition to said select data.

25. The system of claim 20, further comprising

receiving at said application processing interface location and diagnostics data from the existing telematics provider relating to at least one asset owned by the customer, said parser parsing the location and diagnostics data, and storing the location and diagnostics data in said datawarehouse;

said application processing interface causing select location and diagnostics data to be provided to a third party application in addition to causing select data to be provided to said third party application.

26. The system of claim 20, further comprising

receiving at said application processing interface location and diagnostics data from the existing telematics provider relating to at least one asset owned by the customer, said parser parsing the location and diagnostics data, and storing the location and diagnostics data in said datawarehouse;

said application processing interface causing select location and diagnostics data to be provided to a third party application in addition to causing said select data and select additional data to be provided to said third party application;

wherein said third party application provides an output based on select location and diagnostics data in addition to said select data and said select additional data.