ZenduCAM Review: A Full-Service Solution That Saves Fleet Owners Time And Money

It isn’t easy being a fleet manager. Unlike a typical office environment, your direct reports are the very definition of “remote workers”. So much of your time is spent keeping track of drivers, vehicles and cargo. It’s complex and exhausting.

Most fleet operations have some sort of dash cam system. And why wouldn’t they? Commercial dash cams protect your business operations, your drivers, and your piece of mind by monitoring driver behavior as well as the road ahead. But not all systems are created equal, leaving you to pick and choose the options that come closest to fulfilling your unique business needs.

What if you could save up to 10 hours in a typical work week with a fully-integrated, customizable telematics solution that actually learns from past driving behaviours to predict future events?

Why ZenduCAM?

The American Trucking Association (ATA) released a report that identified cars as being at-fault in over 80% of commercial truck-related crashes. A commercial dash cam not only protects your driver from false claims from motorists, it can help prevent these incidents in the first place. 

ZenduIT’s ZenduCAM dash camera was designed as an integrated business solution for commercial fleets. There’s a lot of business intelligence developed around these products based on three main pillars: safety, liability and coaching. 

ZenduCAM has the same hardware features as many of its competitors; most commercial dash cams offer dual or single-camera options, data storage (either cloud-based or SD card) and a variety of lens options depending on the content you want to capture.

Where ZenduCAM stands apart is in its service offerings, which are entirely customizable according to your specific needs. Most dashcam systems simply ‘record’ video (sometimes up to 30 hours at a time), leaving frustrated managers having to run through hours of footage to find the event they’re looking for. With ZenduCAM, you only receive the content rules you’ve preselected, which saves you time, productivity and money. “We supply 20 hours of video triggered by specific events,” says Vishal Singh, Co-Founder and President at ZenduIT, “Imagine getting those 10 hours back in your work week!”

AI + ML = A Fully-Integrated Telematics Platform

Singh points to comprehensive AI analysis and machine learning to minimize false positives and trigger actionable events. He says: “Our software learns the difference between, for example, whether your driver is holding a phone up to his face or simply scratching his nose.”

While AI and facial recognition work hand-in-hand to detect driver drowsiness and distractions, Singh’s team reviews your video footage and tags events such as harsh braking, sharp turning, lane weaving or excessive speed.

What’s more, your drivers can review the footage as well (when they’re not driving, of course). At the end of each month, you receive a scorecard for each driver, which you can review either with your team or independently. This provides specific, actionable feedback to prevent further events from triggering and ultimately, to improve driver safety culture.

A Continuous Learning Platform

Ultimately, this makes the notion of dash cams less about “surveillance” and more about ongoing, continuous learning opportunities, which lead to improved driving behaviors, increased safety and productivity. Having real-time feedback in addition to monthly scorecard reviews available in the Trax platform ensures safety and compliance, whether or not your driver is behind the wheel. “ ZenduIT coaches drivers on behalf of your fleet manager,” says Singh. “It’s just part of the fully-integrated managed services that we offer.”

Singh emphatically identifies continuous learning — both from a software and human perspective —  as one of ZenduCAM’s main selling features. “Let’s not use the stick approach on our drivers every chance we get for every event we get. Let’s allow the drivers to look at their performance through mobility,” he recommends. “Let’s allow them to evaluate their performance, let’s allow them to coach themselves … with material that will relate to the actual event.”

There’s An App For That

The Trax platform that ZenduCAM is available on is expandable for more than driver surveillance needs. In addition to providing a livestream of the road or driver-facing camera installed in the vehicle, it can be home to numerous ZenduIT solutions to help fleets run in a more efficient manner. Among the many, some to highlight are the following

• ZenduMaintenance, or otherwise known as ZenduMA; a full 360 maintenance application, providing vehicle maintenance information such as oil usage, mileage, etc.
• Zendu TimeCard; a solution to track and monitor the working and non working hours of employees to ensure individuals are following hours-of-service requirements or for monitoring employee reporting of time
• ZenScore; a solution to score and track the performance of employees to ensure operations are staying safe and optimized. 

Knowing business process automation inside and out is part of what has made Singh’s ZenduCAM venture a success. The devices don’t simply focus on capturing video; rather, they work symbiotically with ZenduIT’s platform to provide tools and workflows that encourage driver safety culture. They’re your true partner in the cab.