Taiwanese connected vehicle developer Antzertech has implemented the MQTT protocol in its vehicle tracking products. The new protocol will reduce network bandwidth requirements, and improve both geographical coverage and real-time response for its telematics and other connected vehicle products.

Antzertech says that compared to conventional TCP-based trackers, its new MQTT-based trackers consume less network bandwidth and feature more reliable connectivity and better real-time response.

Antzertech’s tracker products include features like multiple vehicle I/O interfaces, user-defined geofencing, driving behaviour alerts, Mobileye Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) notifications, ODBII and J1939 CAN protocols, dead reckoning (DR), patented CAN-to-ADR technology, and multiple options of WWAN communication interfaces.

MQTT is an open standard protocol created for constrained devices and low-bandwidth, high-latency, or unreliable networks – typical for vehicles in fleet management applications. Compared with HTTP, MQTT features faster response and throughput, as well as lower battery and bandwidth usage, making it suited for fleet management applications where connectivity is intermittent, bandwidth is at a premium, cloud applications need to interact with multiple tracking devices, and reliable data transmission is a key requirement. MQTT’s low bandwidth requirements allows users to use low-cost data plans or LPWAN such as LTE-M or NBIOT. 

The company says that as MQTT is a standard protocol widely used in IoT applications, customers can set up their fleet management platforms in public or private clouds. Antzertech’s vehicle trackers also enable customers to save significant costs thanks to MQTT’s light data load – without compromising trackers’ rich features.