Adelie Foods - one of the biggest food distributors and Food to Go (FTG) manufacturers in the UK - is rolling out Mobileye’s safety technology on a new fleet of vehicles.

The company’s fleet completes 24,500 journeys every week, covers more than 12.5 million miles each year, and makes more than 12 million sandwiches every month.

Adelie Foods, based near Heathrow Airport, is investing in Mobileye’s retrofit collision avoidance system which automatically alerts a fleet driver to various road dangers for 30 new 3.5 tonne delivery vehicles.

The Mobileye system reads the road, and can provide visual and aural alerts in the event of an imminent collision with another vehicle, pedestrian or cyclist, unintended lane departure, an unsafe headway time, and speeding.

As well as producing sandwiches for a range of retailers Adelie Foods distributes for other manufacturers and has its own URBAN Eat brand, targeting a sector of the FTG market who want tasty but healthy food.

Glenn Buick, distribution manager at Adelie Foods, said: “At the heart of the FTG industry is distribution. The safety of our drivers, of other road users, and of the communities we serve is our top priority.

“We have an excellent safety record but Mobileye will give us an extra layer of protection, as well as ensuring drivers constantly meet the incredibly high standards we expect of them.

“If a vehicle in front brakes suddenly, for example, Mobileye will automatically alert the driver providing additional time to avoid a rear end shunt.

“We are already getting fantastic feedback from drivers who have trialled the system in their vehicles to date and found it both highly effective and straightforward to use.”

Adelie Foods has more than 200 vehicles serving four manufacturing locations and seven distribution centres across the UK. The company’s locations include Cardiff, Tamworth, Leicester, Warrington, Middlesbrough and Kilmarnock as well as its Hounslow base. The Mobileye system was installed in partnership with one of the company’s UK distributors, Handsfree.

Jeremy Coleman, Mobileye’s UK manager, said: “One of the challenges Adelie Foods faces is that their vehicles do a lot of miles on different types of road - from urban areas and city centres, to long distances on motorways and A roads.

“Mobileye can continuously monitor and protect whatever road the vehicle is on, with even the very best driver able to benefit from our technology that monitors headway time, speed and lane position, as well as alerting to potential collisions at any speed.

“Mobileye has taken the technology that we supply to OEMs to power ADAS and autonomous driving capabilities, and engineered a retrofit safety product that can be economically installed on virtually any vehicle already on the road, or rolling off the production line today.”

Mobileye - recently acquired by Intel - has developed software and a chip that can interpret in great detail the pictures from a camera installed on the front of a vehicle; the company’s Shield+ product for larger vehicles adds blind spot protection on the left and right sides.

A recent study of Shield+ in Washington State in the USA proved Mobileye’s ability to reduce accidents and incidents versus a control group: buses installed with Shield+ had no ‘events’, whereas the control group without Mobileye experienced 284.

Coleman added: “For the first time we are offering UK fleets safety technology that can automatically alert a driver to danger. UK fleets now have an opportunity to prevent accidents before they happen, rather than simply record them for subsequent review or require a driver to look at a monitor.

“Our view is that fleets need to shift their focus from recording accidents and reviewing data, to giving drivers every possible ADAS tool to help them stay safe.”

Chris Baines, Handsfree groups sales director, said: “Our aim is to deliver products and aftercare services which directly support the responsibilities of safety, compliance, efficiency and awareness.

“We are proud to offer Adelie Foods a turn-key service for the Mobileye System, from installation to an in-depth maintenance and specifically designed aftercare plan.”

Picture caption: from left to right, Glenn Buick, Jeremy Coleman and Chris Baines