THE first trials of an new 'smart' vehicle tracker have been launched in York.

Car rental franchis Autohorn Fleet Services is trialling the V-Trak - a new device which uses inter-networking technology, known as the internet of things (ioT) - to pinpoint a vehicle's location, and record performance and logistics, without having to be hard-wired to the vehicle.

The device was developed by Stonelin Communications based in Staffordshire, backed telecom company Orange, and is looking for £1m from investors to get the devices on to the market.

Scott Jenkins, Autohorn’s sales and operations director, said: "The four we have on trial will be moving around with our drivers as they go out to deliver or collect different rental and lease vehicles.

"We have 300 cars on our rental fleet, which is a franchise of Europcar, serving York and the surrounding area, and our company Flexed.co.uk leases cars right across the UK, from Fiat 500s to Land Rovers and BMWs. This means the V-Trak will get some really exhaustive frontline testing. We can use them to pinpoint where a driver is at any particular moment and use the information to update the customer on how long it will take them to arrive."

Stonelin Communications - run by business partners Steven Stone in the UK and Dabin Lin in Hong Kong - have previously developed Pettorway, an ioT tracker for pets, the D-Trak, for families dealing with relatives with dementia, and the W-Trak, a time management system for home care workers.

Steven Stone said: "V-Trak resulted from our research which showed that while the vehicle tracking sector is enormous and serviced by a large number of companies, large and small, all of the trackers currently offered have to be fitted by a specialist.

"This normally involves the vehicle being off the road for a complete working day and a cost of between £250 and £500. Add to this the fact that vehicles are replaced every two years and the cost becomes enormous. By contrast, the V-Trak is powered from either a cigarette lighter or USB socket, which makes it much easier to move it from vehicle to vehicle and potentially leads to major savings for operators. We’re delighted that Autohorn Fleet Services has agreed to trial a number of V-Traks. The scale and diversity of their operations are the ideal test-bed for our product and I’m glad to hear that they are already proving their worth."

For more information go to invesdor.com/en/pitches/800 or stonelincom.com