Bridgestone UK’s app goes global

Bridgestone UK’s tyre monitoring app is now being rolled out across other European markets. According to the company, the sales force assisting ‘Challenge’ app works by calculating the true cost of tyres over time and shares the performance data with all other users, before providing performance comparisons against competitors’ tyres – all on the user’s tablet.

Deployed in 2012, the technology has revolutionised Bridgestone’s sales process and is now regarded as a strategic tool, after being created by RNF Digital. Bridgestone’s product and marketing manager Andy Mathias said: “We are proud of our innovative use of technology to help serve our customers and sales force. The application that we developed in the UK is now being used across Europe and is even being trialed in North and South America.”

Users can wirelessly synchronise their device with a centralised server, whereupon the sales representative’s data is uploaded. 

At the same time, data captured by other representatives is downloaded to the device. Bridgestone reports that this means the application has a significant body of globally sourced data at its disposal. The idea is that a tyre’s relative performance can therefore be objectively determined, which enables the sales representative to make an informed recommendation. 

By sharing data in this manner it effectively creates a ‘crowd sourcing’ experience, where users are mutually benefiting from data being collated from various locations across the globe. It all means that users are no longer constrained by having to generate the data in their offices before presenting them to clients and can now create and discuss immediately with the customer. 

The app also provides Bridgestone with a wealth of previously unobtainable management information, not only in terms of how their own tyres are performing, but also how they are performing against their competitors.