One recent innovation for updating vehicle data is the new "sandbox" functionality. Can you explain the purpose of that functionality?
For many years, AAIA and MOTOR were the sole input into the standard. In doing the pre-1975 work and getting all this other data, we found we didn't have the ability to test the data before rolling out to subscribers. What sandbox does is give us an opportunity to roll the data out to power subscribers, and test it before it becomes public.
With the pre-1975 data, all sorts of things happened. Records would get truncated, etc. Because the standard is so visible in the market, you really can't run the risk of having to ask for a "do-over."
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What do the power subscribers do when presented with this test data?
They run it through their processes. Because we have so many different types of subscribers, they may be looking at the data in a totally different way than someone else is. Sandbox is nice because we can switch users on and off. If one data set is really more pertinent to a certain base of subscribers than others, we'll get power users from that area.
For example, right now we're using it for the heavy-duty group, and they are looking at heavy-duty data. When we put in farm tractor data, then that team who is really interested in farm tractors can look at it, check the data and make sure it's working. Then we'll roll that out after 30 or 90 days, depending on what the team tells us.
What do you think are the biggest technology challenges the aftermarket faces right now?
In the near term it's making sure everybody is converted over by year-end. Speed to market has also always been an issue. The VCdb Efficiency project will allow us to publish significantly faster, since we can publish fewer attributes.
Where is the market at in terms of adoption of the standards, and conversion from legacy?
From our standpoint, we're in pretty good shape. There will be some surprises, and some of the smaller companies may not have this on their radar as much as it should be. But I think for the most part, if you look at the larger companies and the companies who have bigger catalogs, they've supported ACES for some time. I believe we are way down that conversion path.
