The Fleet

Sometimes the smartest freight route is A to C to B. Lacy Greening, Assistant Professor of Industrial Engineering at Arizona State University and a semifinalist in the DOT's ARPA-I Innovation Challenge, studies the hidden math of middle-mile freight — the hubs, lanes, and consolidation decisions that determine how goods actually move across a network. In this episode, she explains why freight netw...

Only 1 in 10 fleet cyber attacks ever gets reported — and the smaller the carrier, the more likely the breach ends quietly in bankruptcy. Joe Ohr, COO of the National Motor Freight Traffic Association (NMFTA), spent 25 years inside fleet IT and telematics before stepping into the role that's made his nonprofit the trucking industry's cybersecurity backbone. In this conversation he walks fleet lead...

Fleet moves your mail, your produce, your workforce — and most people have no idea how big the industry actually is. Zā Farley, founder and CEO of Black Fleet Network, joins Chris Brandt on The Fleet to talk about community as infrastructure, why network is a verb, and how the leaders growing inside fleet are the ones expanding bandwidth, building real relationships, and refusing to stay comfortab...

When a business changes, the fleet cannot stop moving. Jennifer VrMeer, Senior Manager of Sales Operations at BD, has helped manage fleet through acquisitions, divestitures, vendor changes, driver expectations, and program redesigns - all inside a 2,500-vehicle healthcare fleet. Her rule for any major transition is simple: business as usual on day one. In this episode of The Fleet , Jen breaks dow...

Fleet strategy only works if drivers actually use it. EV rollouts. Safety tech. Policy changes. Vendor consolidation. Every major fleet initiative eventually comes down to the same question: will drivers buy in? Michael Acosta helps manage more than 1,300 vehicles across the US, Canada, Mexico, and Brazil for UCB with a two-person team. And his belief is simple: the biggest lever in fleet is not t...

4 people. 18,000 vehicles. No blown engines. How does that work? Charles Schott is Fleet Director at Rollins, one of the largest service fleets in North America - 20 pest control brands, 4,000 vehicles refreshed every year, 90% service compliance. He's built fleet operations at global scale before: 30,000+ vehicles across 70 countries at Pfizer, armored fleet at Brinks, now Rollins. In this episod...

Fleet safety isn’t just accidents - it’s what your data says you did about them. In this episode, Brian Kinniry - Director of Safety and Collision Product Management at Element Fleet Management - reveals how the shift from reactive to proactive safety programs is transforming fleet operations. With nuclear verdicts reaching seven and eight figures, traditional "train after the accident" approaches...

Physical AI is rewriting what's possible for autonomous fleets, and the infrastructure decisions you make today determine your competitive position in 2035. Colin Dhillon, futurist and advisor to NuPort Robotics, joins Chris Brandt on The Fleet to explain why fleet leaders who start building autonomous capability now gain compounding advantages over those who wait for "perfect" solutions. Neural n...

Cargo theft has fundamentally evolved – and the criminals behind it aren't breaking locks. They're forging documents, building fake carrier identities, and running what amounts to a direct-to-consumer pipeline for stolen goods. In this episode, Danny Ramon, Intelligence and Response Manager at Overhaul, reveals how modern cargo theft works. With 15 years in supply chain security and hands-on exper...

Fleets are undergoing a once-in-a-century transformation and the companies leading this shift aren't traditional automakers. In this episode, Philipp Kampshoff, Co-founder of McKinsey's Center for Future Mobility and the Global Co-lead of its Automotive Practice, and Dor Shay, CTO of Element Mobility and Autofleet, break down what's really changing in fleet operations.   You'll discover why $1 tri...

You’re not stuck because there aren’t enough chargers. Dr. Sheldon Williamson, professor at Ontario Tech, explains why the real constraint is when and how power hits the grid, not where vehicles sit. Chris Brandt hosts this episode of The Fleet covering smart charging, grid stress, incentives, battery tech, and why tomorrow’s fleet leaders will need energy literacy as much as operational know-how....

Vehicles were designed for an old era of transportation. The modern fleet demands a redesign. In this episode of The Fleet, Will Graylin, Founder & CEO of IndiGO Technologies, explores how today’s fleet needs have outgrown traditional vehicle assumptions, and why electrification works best when vehicles, charging, and deployment are designed together as a system. From last-mile delivery and chargi...

The world’s next fleet evolution isn’t just electric - it’s contextual. Chris Brandt sits down with Dominique Kwong, Founder and CEO of Damon, to explore how “data with context” can prevent accidents before they happen, how micro-mobility is reshaping last-mile delivery, and why Gen Z may push fleets toward an access-over-ownership model faster than expected.   Key Moments: 0:00 Why Contextual Dat...

From vertiports to predictive maintenance, Aviation is entering a new era - and the supply chain is under pressure. In this episode of The Fleet, WestJet’s Director of Supply Chain, Shail Oza, explains how electric aviation, flight analytics, and new infrastructure will transform airline operations.   Key Moments (audio versions): 0:00 The Airline Industry Is About to Transform 1:33 Shail Oza Expl...

What creates good city infrastructure? What makes it fail? Professor Shauna Brail from the University of Toronto joins The Fleet to unpack why cities remain the beating heart of innovation, what makes infrastructure succeed or fail, and how human-centric design is quietly redefining mobility. From post-industrial skylines to the rise of third spaces and multimodal fleets, this episode explores wha...

Fleet leaders face chaos. Use analytics to thrive in it. On this episode of The Fleet, Steve Jastrow, SVP of Client Advisory and Analytics at Element Fleet Management, joins host Chris Brandt to explain how mobility chaos is an opportunity. Explore how AI-driven analytics and camera technology are reshaping safety, efficiency, and the entire culture of fleet management. From leasing versus ownersh...

Most companies say they’ll go electric someday. AstraZeneca didn’t wait.   Procurement leader Alejandra Torres shows how her team at AstraZeneca built a carbon-zero fleet across Latin America - proving that going electric isn’t just sustainable, it’s smart business. From cutting fuel costs to turning sustainability into ROI, here’s why waiting for the market is the real mistake.   Key Moments:   0...

Real freedom isn’t parked in your driveway. It arrives there when you need it to. This week on The Fleet, Chris Brandt sits down with Sampo Hietanen, founder of MaaS Global and Aspectu, and the original mind behind Mobility as a Service. Together, they explore how MaaS is transforming not just transportation, but the entire fabric of urban life. Where fleets, data, and design come together to move...

Should we be preparing for the autonomous electric fleet revolution… or has it already arrived?   Chris sits down with Dr. Sven Beiker (Silicon Valley Mobility; ex-BMW, Stanford CARS, McKinsey) to cut through hype and explain where EVs and AVs actually stand — and what it will take to scale them.   You’ll hear why the “gold rush” era of autonomy is over, what’s working shockingly well (hello, robo...

The road ahead for fleet management is changing fast — and this is your first look. Get a glimpse of the big questions host Chris Brandt will be tackling with industry-leaders, including: How will electrification and autonomous vehicles transform your operations?  What new risks and opportunities will global supply chains, AI, and connected vehicles create?  And what strategies will fleet leaders...

What does it take to be nominated as Driver of the Year? 6,000,000 accident-free miles in a career is a good start. Jan Quarnberg is a driver for Barney Trucking and was recently selected as a Lytx Driver of the Year. He’s been a professional truck driver for over 40 years and has received numerous awards throughout his career, including the Lytx/DriveCam Good Driving Award and the Glen Barney Hau...

For much of our show, we’ve focused on our market here in the United States, but what about the rest of the world? Fleet Managers that get assigned to international markets quickly learn just how different other countries operate compared to the United States.  Size of roads, availability of refueling stations, access to repairs and maintenance, laws and regulations, traffic density, and accessway...

Where does a city turn in order to make their roads safer? Who does a private fleet call to improve driving conditions for its drivers?  Because these questions went largely unanswered, a new organization was created to better address solutions for safer roads. From companies like ABInbev and UPS to city governments, Together for Safer Roads, or TSR for short, is a global coalition on a mission to...

We are psychologically incapable of putting down the phone.  That might sound horrific, but Dr. Paul Atchley, a Professor of Psychology at the University of South Florida, has studied human behavior for decades and he’s convinced distracted driving is part of our everyday lives, that people want more entertainment and connectivity options while driving, and most importantly, we as a culture find i...

Driver shortage?  There’s no driver shortage.  So why is the trucking industry having such a hard time filling its open jobs?  According to today’s guest, the cause is not a shortage of drivers, but an abundance of options.  Joining the show is FreightWaves’ Grace Sharkey. FreightWaves is like the Bloomberg of transportation -- they report on all the logistics, trends, and news that fuel the globa...