ERoad says lobbyist attempts to stall logging device rollout in US; too soon to assess impact

Monday 24th July 2017

ERoad says a transport lobby group is attempting to delay the US introduction of electronic logging devices for transport operators and has succeeded in getting a bill introduced to the US Congress.

The US is a key growth market for ERoad's ELDs. Under an existing mandate, transport operators must install the ELDs by Dec. 18. But the Owner Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA) had been lobbying the Congress, ERoad said in a statement.

“We believe the efforts by OOIDA to delay the ELD mandate at the 11th hour is unlikely to succeed,” said chief executive Steven Newman “Many national stakeholders are proactively lobbying against it, including the largest national trade association for the trucking industry, the American Trucking Associations (ATA).”

Newman said it was too early to assess whether OOIDA would succeed in delaying use of ELDs but the delay attempts "do however create potential confusion for carriers who now have less than five months to install ELD devices and train drivers prior to the mandate coming into effect." OOIDA had unsuccessfully challenged the ELD mandate in the US Supreme Court.

The logistics and fleet management software company posted a wider loss in the year ended March 31 of $5.3 million, reflecting its investment in the US market, although the result was better than it had forecast. Earlier this month the company said quarterly sales in the US posted their fastest growth, with 1,321 contracted units in the US in the three months ended June 30, taking its total number of devices to 7,423. ERoad sold 3,090 units in its established New Zealand and Australian markets, with 45,029 contracted units across Australasia,

The shares last traded at 2.35 and reached an 11-month high of $2.351 last week. They traded as high as $4.28 in 2014, when the company raised $40 million in an initial public offering to help finance its launch in the US. The IPO price was $3.

(BusinessDesk)

Comments from our readers

No comments yet