Since 2006, all new trucks and buses in the EU have had to carry digital tachographs, devices that record speed, distance and driver activity. That same year in Verona, Italy, former software architect and project manager Dr Claudio Carrano founded Infogestweb.
The firm's main product is GOLIA, an IT platform that stores and analyses tachograph data in real time to help fleet managers comply with strict laws on driving and rest times. For help promoting this innovation, the 12-employee SME turned to Marco Gorini, head of technology transfer at Veneto Innovazione. He saw huge international potential for the platform, noting: "GOLIA could clearly play a role in harmonising legislation within the EU and beyond."
Gorini provided Infogestweb with a range of brokering services, after a technology audit to better understand the potential and gaps in the company's developed technologies. These services included advice on innovation and technology transfer and on building an internationalisation strategy. Gorini suggested that Infogestweb use the Enterprise Europe Network to identify potential partners, as a way of helping the company to improve GOLIA and get it adopted more widely.
In 2010, the company participated in the ITN brokerage event in Turin, leading to an association with a French company to provide extra satellite coverage for GOLIA. "We received several expressions of interest, after promoting GOLIA on the Network technology cooperation database - including one from BB Servis Ekipmanlari in Turkey," said Gorini. His Network colleagues at Unioncamere Veneto also provided Infogestweb with useful information on relevant EU legislation and the regulation/penalties applying to the use of digital tachographs in EU countries.
BB Servis Ekipmanlari - a company selling automotive garage and service equipment, plus tachograph data download and analysis solutions - is a Network client of Cemile Köseler at the Istanbul Chamber of Industry. She recalls: "We sent our client a bulletin on partnership proposals every week, which is how it learned about Infogestweb in Italy. With help from my colleague Marco, we initially put the two companies in touch with one another."
As a result of this link-up, BB Servis is now selling GOLIA in Turkey and Infogestweb is preparing a dedicated website in Turkish. Köseler believes that both companies will enjoy an even more fruitful cooperation, after Turkey has further aligned its tachograph rules with those of the EU.
Nuri Günay, who founded BB Servis in 2007, hopes his 10-employee firm will land new clients by offering consulting and real-time data analysis services related to GOLIA. Encouraged by its recent expansion, Infogestweb also now has its sights set on other markets, including Spain and the Czech Republic.
Claudio Carrano adds that his firm and BB Servis are still collaborating and he is now developing a new application based on the same technology, but for different markets and users.