BlackLine GPS Blog

CALGARY, AB & LOS ANGELES, CA - BlackLine GPS Inc. (“BlackLine”), a leading global positioning service company, announced today that a private equity group led by Cody Slater and Clark Swanson, agreed on terms and conditions to complete a strategic, undisclosed investment to acquire a minority stake in BlackLine.

Mr. Cody Slater and Mr. Clark Swanson join BlackLine’s board of directors as Chairman of the Board and Director, respectively. Mr. Slater participates as a key non-executive officer of BlackLine GPS in their ongoing operations. In addition to joining the board, Mr. Swanson, based in Los Angeles, CA will also provide business development assistance to BlackLine, leveraging his business experience within the global marketplace.

“Cody brings a wealth of business and manufacturing expertise to our company. As one of Canada’s widely recognized entrepreneurs, he built BW Technologies (“BW”) from a start-up to one of the world’s leading gas detection companies. Cody provides incredible value to BlackLine and we’re thrilled to welcome Cody and his team to the company,” says Mr. Brendon Cook, BlackLine’s Co-Founder and Executive Vice President.

BlackLine is also pleased to announce that it has attracted additional talent to the company, filling out its executive team. “Mr. Neil Campbell joins us as Vice President Sales and offers considerable experience in the tech and commercial sector having spearheaded the creation of BW’s international distribution channel. Mr. Kirk Wankel has accepted the role of Chief Financial Officer and shares a successful history with BW, having served as their Vice President Finance. Completing our senior team is Mr. Barry Moore, Vice President Product Development. Barry’s experience with BW as Vice President Product Development will be instrumental in executing BlackLine’s device strategy,” says Mr. Patrick Rousseau, BlackLine’s Co-Founder and President. “We look forward to their contributions as we continue building our brand and competing successfully in the global marketplace.”

BlackLine’s position in the market has attracted a group of notable high net-worth investors including two members of the Fortune list of the 500 wealthiest people. One of those, the King family, is widely known for their success in the television industry stemming from the family-owned business, Kingworld CBS, previously Kingworld Productions. The second includes Mr. Daryl Katz who founded The Katz Group, one of North America’s most successful drug store operators. Among other ventures, Mr. Katz is well-known for his pursuit and pending acquisition of the National Hockey League’s Edmonton Oilers franchise.

“Brendon and Patrick made this investment very easy for our group,” said Mr. Slater. “They have achieved enormous gains in their business over a short period of time and on a well-managed budget. BlackLine is well positioned with a management team who possesses vision and quality of execution, and the capital required to fuel incredible growth. I’m extraordinarily excited about BlackLine’s future, as are our investors.”

About BlackLine GPS Inc.
Based in Calgary, AB, BlackLine GPS Inc. engineers exceptional customer experiences that couple GPS and wireless technology. BlackLine works diligently to lead the market in location-based awareness and tracking by providing high-value, practical, and easy-to-use products and services. BlackLine markets products under the brands of GPS Snitch, Loner GPS, and Blip. BlackLine owns end-to-end solutions that encompass dedicated wireless devices, smartphone application software, back-office server infrastructure, billing systems, and convenient user interfaces.

For more information, visit www.blacklinegps.com.

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© Copyright 2008 BlackLine GPS Inc. All rights reserved. The BlackLine GPS Inc. families of related marks, images and symbols are the exclusive properties and trademarks of BlackLine GPS Inc. All other brands, product names, company names, trademarks and service marks are the properties of their respective owners.

Work for the best in LBS (location based services)!

We have posted a number of positions within our organization on our Web site (here) and are looking for skilled people to complement our team. If you are interested in a position with BlackLine GPS in Calgary, AB and know you have the qualifications and personality that we’re looking for, please don’t hesitate to apply. Email a cover letter, resume, and portfolio (as applicable) to us before everyone else.

Tags: , lbs, tracking, gps, blackberry, career

Some of the Blackline crew is at the Performance Racing Industry show in Orlando Florida this week. Lucky them getting away from the snow and cold at our Calgary head office.

Come down and visit us in Booth 4915 to learn more about FUEL, Our high performance data acquisition system.

Also don’t forget to ask about our consumer tracking products like GPS Snitch.

Tell the guys in the booth that Jeff and Yves say hi !

Tags: gps, racing logger, lap timer, data acquisition, PRI, Performance Racing Industry

It’s always great when GPS Snitch is able to assist a friend in a new endeavor! Sean Blanchette and his team (Team Lucy) just competed in the 24 Hours of Adrenalin this past weekend in Canmore, Alberta. For those of you unfamiliar, the 24 Hours of Adrenalin is a mountain bike relay race. The baton is passed from one rider to the next on the completion of each lap for 24 continuous hours.

Sean was competing in the race for the first time and seeking insight; questioned some experienced participants. Sean found that “the recurring issue was the wait time for the next rider. If a rider was slow, or had a flat tire, the waiting rider could end up standing for over half an hour.” This was unacceptable for Sean and with his knowledge GPS Snitch, sought BlackLine out to assist him and his team in this endurance competition.

Since the Race was held in the Kananaskis, “there was no power for devices like laptops.” Sean needed a mobile & power smart solution for viewing and requesting of GPS Snitch location data. Luckily the team here at BlackLine GPS has been hard at work on some very new Snitch Beta software for the BlackBerry Pearl. With the new software, his BlackBerry Pearl and GPS Snitch, Team Lucy and Sean were able to pass the baton and Snitch each lap and “never waited more than 5 minutes at the waiting area.”

Sean was also pretty happy with the post mission analysis, “As an added bonus, once the race was over, we were able to check the GPS history and take a look at things like course length, speed and elevation using Google Earth.”

BlackLine would like to send congratulations out to Sean and Team Lucy for competing and finishing this endurance race.

Watch out for BlackLine on your back tire next year!

Jim

Tag: BlackLine GPS, 24 Hours of Adrenaline, GPS Snitch, BlackBerry Pearl, Tracking, RIM

The Crew here at BlackLine GPS always jump at the opportunity to have our GPS based products evaluated and put through their paces.  When the editors at Modified Magazine agreed to evaluate the features and performance of GPS Snitch, we seized the opportunity!  

For those of you who are not familiar with Modified, they are the leading authority in the high-octane world of sport compact and import cars.  The magazine and editors are industry leaders who encounter new products and technology on a daily baisis; for them to stop and take notice, it has to be a new and unique product.     

 © Copyright Modified Magazine

It’s very rewarding when all the effort and hardwork we’ve put into GPS Snitch is validated by industry professionals.   

If you’re near a news stand this March and April, please stop and check out the article! 

Jim

Tag: Modified Magazine, Modified, snitch, gps snitch, vehicle alarm, gps tracking, automotive security, car alarm, automobile alarm, auto alarm, auto security, gps tracker, gps locator, tracking, telematics, wireless, wireless location, gps

Our Friends at Modified recently had the opportunity to test our freshly minted Fuel Mobile 2.0 Software! Modified took the opportunity to run it though the mill at the Redline Time Attack in Fontana, California.  Our new Tuning Software deliver’s real magazine style testing with no installation, calibration or annoying sensors.  Just turn on FUEL GPS, connect to FUEL with your Windows Smart Phone and your off to the races! 

Photograph is courtesy of Modified Magazine

Here are a few screenshots of our Logging Program running on Windows Mobile 5.

Select your desired tuning function

Interested in doing an acceleration and brake test? Fuel Tune delivers with automated sound and visual prompts for braking.  It can’t get any easier!

Our GPS precision and high update rate allows for Fuel GPS Drag Run’s to be more accurate than any G sensor!

Interested in doing a Skid Pad test?

Fuel Mobile has many other functions, including real time lap and data acquisiton to deliver all your racing information for later analysis in FUEL Analysis Tool (aka FAT)

You can check out more pictures and see what Modified was up to at the Redline Time Attack here, Modified Redline Time Attack Feature Article. It looks like its going to be a great season and the competition looks tight for the 2007 season!  

See you at the track,

Jim

Tag: gps, speed sensor, high accuracy gps, racing, race data logger, racing logger, gps lap timer, lap timer, gps speed sensor, data acquisition, Modified, drag racing, Fuel Mobile, Red Line Time Attack

Yes, GPS Snitch has arrived in the EU and is en route to the 3GSM show in Barcelona, accompanied by a few of our people. It is early evening in France and our team is settling in for the night, enjoying some French culture.

GPS Snitch is roaming in France, supported by our North American network operations center. Within my browser, from the time of request, locations are being returned in about 30 seconds. When one location comes back, GPS Snitch is able to return following locations in about 9 seconds, even thought it is an ocean away.

When we designed GPS Snitch, we chose GSM communications for this very purpose, to be able to deploy in other regions of the world and retain network and infrastructure compatibility. Competing CDMA technology does not currently offer this global coverage benefit. The supporting technology of GPS Snitch is pretty incredible.

Even though we designed the GPS Snitch product and supporting services, events occur where we find ourselves very impressed with its performance and capability, again refocusing our appreciation of what we have created. Seeing GPS Snitch operation on foreign soil is rewarding to see, indeed.

GPRS, the data layer of GSM, utilizes the Internet as a backbone of mobile communication. Though network latency increases with increased separation between nodes on the Internet, in reality, the extra communication delay from overseas is quite small due to the quality of overseas communications links. Possibly in the region of a tenth of a second. Practically, this additional delay doesn’t detract from the overall experience of using GPS Snitch, when other events take a small number of seconds.

Prior to my trip to China last month, where I set up our manufacturing line, Internet communications to North America, and other parts of the world, were severely affected by an underwater Earthquake near Taiwan. Major infrastructure was damaged, reducing the communications bandwidth, increasing congestion, and increasing communications delay. This type of communications breakdown can affect international use of GPS Snitch devices and is one important reason for BlackLine GPS to deploy network operations centers in strategic locations around the world. Quality of service is an important commitment.

As we attend the 3GSM show, we will keep a close eye upon the state of the mobile wireless world and use this insight within our international planning of infrastructure.

I hope you’re having a good Saturday,

Brendon

3GSM, snitch, gps snitch, vehicle alarm, gps tracking, automotive security, car alarm, automobile alarm, auto alarm, auto security, gps tracker, gps locator, tracking, telematics, wireless, wireless location, gps

Foggy Petronas Racing utilized our FUEL GPS 20 Hz system during this past 2006 World Superbike season. The race data engineers required accurate speed output and positional data and Fuel delivered this data with great success! We wanted to take this opportunity to thank everybody at FPR and wish them luck in their future endeavors.

Here is a couple pictures from the 2006 season.

Make sure to keep an eye out for FUEL GPS in the top tiers of racing in North America and Europe in 2007!

Jim

Tag: gps, speed sensor, high accuracy gps, racing, race data logger, racing logger, gps lap timer, lap timer, gps speed sensor, data acquisition

We’re here in overcast Flordia, exhibiting at the Performance Racing Industry (PRI) trade show. For us Canadians, the temperature is balmy, however, overcast. The forecast is for continued overcast-ness and showers through the show.

This show is, in fact, the world’s largest racing show. We attended last year, introducing our FUEL GPS high accuracy racing system and met many great people and companies. Many of our FUEL product’s sales can be attributed to our attendance of last year’s show.

In addition to FUEL, we are showing our GPS Snitch tracking and vehicle security product at PRI. One of our friends had a trailer with two competition superbikes stolen last year. If only he had a GPS Snitch in this trailer at the time! PRI should have a good interest level in Snitch.

If you are attending the show, please don’t hesitate to stop by booth 4915 and say hello to Patrick and Jim.

Brendon

Tags: car alarm, vehicle alarm, gps tracking, automotive security, car alarm, automobile alarm, auto alarm, auto security, gps tracker, gps locator, tracking, telematics, wireless, wireless location, gps

Hello everyone,

This just in from the National Post here in Canada:

Since this link may not last long, here’s what Lowell Conn from the CanWest News Service has to say about GPS Snitch:
“INDULGE SUSPICION The Blackline GPS Snitch makes an interesting stocking stuffer. A self-contained tracker that requires no installation — just turn it on and hide it in the vehicle — the device monitors vehicle movement and can send notification via e-mail or text message to a mobile phone when it detects your car leaving a pre-defined area. It’s a good way to rest peacefully knowing your child cannot steal your wheels. But, when you’ve permitted use of the family car, log on to the Web site at www.gps-snitch.com to track it in real time. If your child is in a region fraught with the solicitation of illicit substances, you’ll know. If your child is hanging out with kids you’ve warned them about, you’ll know. And if your child has crossed the border with said substances in the company of said kids, you’ll know about it — even if you don’t want to. Too much knowledge can be a bad thing — this device should probably be used with discretion. US$400; visit www.blacklinegps.com.

lconn@nationalpost.com”

Brendon

Tags: car alarm, vehicle alarm, gps tracking, automotive security, car alarm, automobile alarm, auto alarm, auto security, gps tracker, gps locator, tracking, telematics, wireless, wireless location, gps