EVAI rebrands as Vehicle Management Systems, brings on new CEO

As a company, EVAI started as an AI platform to assist fleets with electrification and EV fleet management. But the rebrand, at its core, shows how VMS’ solutions are meant for a wider audience, Prusinski told Fleet Maintenance.

“[The rebrand] really represented the fact that it's not necessarily just an EV world,” he explained. “The fact is EVAI had created an amazing AI-enabled platform, and it solved problems not just for EVs but for ICE [vehicles], and for multi-brand [vehicles], and the rebranding to VMS really does signify the greater scope of the solutions that we can address, and the problems that we can solve for the market.”

And according to Prusinski, that greater market is largely for smaller fleets, dealers, and service networks, with the ultimate goal of “democratiz[ing] fleet and retail uptime solutions for a lot of the underserved markets that exist out there.”

And with a long career in software, both in vehicles and as a service, Prusinski is ready to guide VMS forward.

Offering the AI advantage to smaller fleets

The co-CEO said that VMS arrived at their democratization goal by seeing how larger fleets were already working with companies to leverage AI for predictive analytics, vehicle prognostics, and analyzing fleet and vehicle data to anticipate and prevent roadside breakdowns. But they wanted to give smaller fleets the same advantages, and believed that VMS was poised to do so because of how AI was integrated into the platform.

“VMS is such a new platform that [AI is] actually integrated and architected at the core of the platform,” Prusinski noted. “So we're not using AI to analyze data, we're actually using AI to decide what's important, to help drive the workflows, and to help turn those vehicles into intelligent, self-reporting assets, whether they're owned by a family or a fleet.”

With this technology, Prusinski said that VMS’ platform is meant to build its information into smaller fleets’ existing workflows, so that the system can flag a problem, tell the fleet to create a repair order, then provide quotes on the work to be done. Plus, he noted how the system can rank high-urgency issues that need to be resolved immediately.

“It does triaging of the issues for fleets, and not just for fleets, but for service networks and for dealers that work with fleets,” Prusinski added.

This integration would let smaller fleets use established workflows to keep their vehicles on the road longer, but without calling for company resources that smaller fleets might not have. Especially since VMS’ platform is agnostic, can handle multiple makes, and work with connected and non-connected vehicles. Basically, “anything that’s got an OBD port and moving forward from the mid 2010s” is fair game.

“We're looking to unlock a longer, smarter, and more transparent life for every vehicle that's on the road out there,” Prusinski affirmed.

Leading VMS forward

For Prusinski, VMS’ work on its platform is familiar. He has two decades of experience in scaling automotive technology teams and has held senior leadership roles in commercial fleet management service, sales, partnerships, marketing, and business development.

“I've been in software for approaching 30 years,” he explained. “I've been in the SAS businesses for approaching 25 years, and for the last 15, I've been in the connected vehicle world.”

This includes his most recent experience as chief revenue officer for Ford’s Integrated Services, including their fleet software work with Ford Pro Intelligence. Before that, Prusinski was CRO of SafeAI, and spent 10 years at Powerfleet, formerly Fleet Complete, another fleet management solutions and data analytics company. All of this experience has helped inform Prusinski’s vision for VMS’ future.

“My long-term vision is to make VMS become the universal AI-powered vehicle health platform,” he concluded. “We want it to be trusted by fleets, drivers, dealerships, and repair shops to unlock longer, smarter, and more transparent life for every vehicle on the road.”