Geotab Inc., a Toronto-based company specializing in fleet management products, has created the Geotab Sustainability Alliance to share innovations and data for fleet decarbonization with its industry peers.

The 28 founding members include professional services firm Deloitte, Quebec-based electric truck and bus manufacturer Lion Electric, German technology company Siemens and Vancouver-based fleet transition company 7Gen.

The alliance was formed because its members “understand the climate crisis requires urgent action,” Eric Mallia, vice-president of sustainability solutions at Geotab, said in an interview with Sustainable Biz Canada.

Transportation accounts for 23 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which puts responsibility on Geotab’s partners to address climate change, he said.

Growing demand for electric vehicles (EVs) and requirements for corporations to disclose carbon dioxide emissions are driving demand for solutions from alliance members.

“To do that we knew that it would take a village and we couldn’t do this all on our own, and that there is a lot of stakeholders that we need to come together to pool resources and ideas and innovation to create the change that we see,” Mallia said.

About the alliance

The alliance framework was created in 2023, when companies utilizing Geotab’s data and solutions for sustainable fleets were assembled to formalize ideas, according to Mallia.

Geotab offers various fleet sustainability services, such as optimizing fuel use to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The alliance is centred around an agreement to collaborate and approach customers and market solutions together by integrating Geotab’s products and services.

The partners are organized into six categories and the corresponding uses of fleet management:

• EV original equipment manufacturers (embedding Geotab’s cloud-to-cloud or factory-installed connected vehicle solutions on new EVs);
• charge management and EV charging station providers (optimizing EV charging to reduce costs and carbon);
• fuel management providers (“tracking and reducing fuel consumption for improved carbon footprint”);
• route optimization partners (finding efficient ways to deploy EVs and reducing costs and emissions);
• EV fleet and sustainability consultants (providing data for EV and sustainability professional services); and
• emerging solutions (supporting developers of ESG software, battery health and charging-as-a-service)

The list of categories is growing, Mallia said. Partners from the sustainability/ESG reporting field have also expressed interest in joining the alliance.

Goals for the fleet management industry are being formalized by the alliance.

Geotab is working to set periodic goals in working toward a net-zero world, and will likely start with a carbon intensity reduction goal in its portfolio as it grows its customer count, Mallia said.