Meet the eight selected for ATA's 2026 Future Leaders Forum. Top row [L-R]: Daniel Mikosic, Chris Swadling, Dimity Andrews and Shane McLoughlin. Bottom row [L-R]: Jacinta Lane, Luke Morton, Mandy Solar and Casuarina Smith. Images: ATA The Australian Trucking Association (ATA), Geotab and Volvo Group Australia have unveiled the eight participants in the 2026 ATA Future Leaders Forum. The Future Leaders Forum is an award-winning leadership program that gives young leaders in the trucking industry the tools and training they need to become strong, effective industry advocates. The 2026 Future Leaders were selected by the ATA's member associations and TruckSafe. "Here we have a diverse group of talented individuals from across the trucking industry," ATA Chair Mark Parry said. "It's important we give them the opportunities, skills and connections to step up and lead. Through the Future Leaders Forum, we're investing in our future leaders today to build a stronger, more resilient industry for tomorrow." The refreshed 2026 program will move to a hybrid format of online and in-person learning, allowing participants to continue working while completing course modules at their own pace. Participants will complete a series of workshops and participate in a group industry advocacy project to be presented at Trucking Australia 2027. In 2024, the Future Leaders Forum won the LearnX Platinum Award for Best Learning and Talent Development in the industry-specific leadership development category. The 2026 participants are: Mandy Solar, Followmont Transport (NatRoad) Mandy is an Operational Trainer at Followmont Transport in Brisbane. She has worked in the trucking industry for five years, starting as a PUD driver before moving into linehaul driving and now her current role. As an Operational Trainer, she works across driver training, assessment and capability development. She also supports onboarding and licence progression through to safety initiatives and broader workforce development projects. She is passionate about moving learning beyond ticking compliance boxes and using it to build genuine capability, confidence and safer outcomes across the transport industry. Jacinta Lane, Airtec (National Road Freighters Association) Jacinta Lane is the Business Manager at Airtec Corporation/Airtec SmartOBM on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, and has been with Airtec for the past five years. Jacinta leads business development, customer relationships, strategic initiatives and marketing, with a focus on delivering technology solutions that improve safety, compliance and operational efficiency across the transport industry. She has played a key role in the market launch and growth of Airtec's AXS SmartOBM system, working closely with transport operators and industry stakeholders to support the adoption of intelligent On-Board Mass technology. Jacinta is also a Director of Transport Women Australia Limited, where she contributes to initiatives supporting and empowering women across Australia's transport and logistics industry. Daniel Mikosic, Multiquip (Livestock, Bulk & Rural Carriers Association) Daniel Mikosic is the General Manager of Multiquip, based in Sydney. With over 15 years of experience in the trucking and transport industry, Daniel has developed extensive expertise in fleet operations, workshop management, compliance, safety and customer service. In his role, Daniel oversees the day-to-day operations of the business, including fleet maintenance, workshop performance, customer relationships and strategic growth initiatives. He is passionate about building strong teams, improving operational efficiency and delivering high-quality outcomes for customers across the transport industry. Casuarina Smith, Trucking with CJ (Transport Women Australia Ltd) Casuarina (CJ) Smith is a heavy vehicle driver and the founder of Trucking with CJ. She holds multi-combination and dangerous goods licences, and over the past decade has worked her way from concrete agitators and truck and dog tippers through to mining, harvest and fuel haulage. Today she hauls a race transporter for Scott Taylor Motorsport to Supercars and Porsche events around the country alongside her contract driving. Since starting Trucking with CJ in 2022, she has built a community of more than 300,000 people across Australia, New Zealand, the UK and the US, sharing the behind-the-scenes of the industry to help attract new people into trucking and support those already in it. Luke Morton, Ron Finemore Transport (TruckSafe) Luke is the Operations Manager - Goulburn/Sydney Division for Ron Finemore Transport based in Marsden Park, Sydney. He has worked for RFT for the past three years managing the driving team and operations staff across Canberra, Goulburn and Sydney. He manages a contract with a large supermarket chain delivering to stores in the metro Sydney, ACT/Riverina and the South Coast area. He was involved in overseeing the contract double in size with budgeted loads and moving depots from Prestons to Marsden Park in Sydney. Chris Swadling, Lindsay Australia (Queensland Trucking Association) Chris is the National Maintenance Manager at Lindsay Transport, based in Sydney. He has worked in the trucking industry for nearly 20 years, starting as an apprentice mechanic in 2007. Chris oversees 140 staff across workshops and wash bays, from Cairns to Tasmania and west to Perth. Lindsay Australia operates seven workshops that maintain all aspects of the fleet, including paint and panel facilities. Dimity Andrews, North West Quarries (Western Australia Transport Industry Association) Dimity works at the intersection of policy, industry research and strategic development for North West Quarries, focusing on workforce, freight and emerging transport challenges across the sector. Her role is to turn industry evidence, stakeholder insight and operational realities into practical policy positions, targeted workforce initiatives and longer-term strategic responses that strengthen the productivity, resilience and future capability of Western Australia's transport industry. Shane McLoughlin, Formula Chemicals (Road Freight New South Wales) Shane is the Operations Manager at Formula Chemicals in West Ryde, NSW and has worked in the trucking industry for 10 years. He started at Formula Chemicals in the chlor-alkali production team, where he developed his technical knowledge and experience in chemical manufacturing. He oversees and coordinates day-to-day operations, working closely with the production, transport, logistics and administration teams to ensure operations are safe, efficient and compliant with company and regulatory requirements. Shane works closely with drivers and the dispatch team to help ensure the safe and efficient delivery of hazardous goods, while maintaining compliance with safety and transport requirements. He also helps improve processes, train new employees and solve operational issues.

Geotab aims to cut fleet crash investigation stress with new product. * By Sean Keywood * | * 22 September 2026 * News A new system from Geotab will make investigating accidents with its telematics data more accessible to a wider range of fleets, the company has said. The new Geotab Investigations product is described as a unified solution for resolving fleet incidents. Capabilities of the system include instantly locating all telematics-based vehicle activity related to an incident using location and time-based search, and combining trips, driver behaviour, speed events and location data to reconstruct a precise timeline of what occurred before, during and after an incident. External materials such as notes, emails, reports, documents, photos and video can be attached and organised, and structured case workflows include clear stages from open to closed. Geotab says the resulting complete, time-aligned records can support operational decisions, insurance claims, compliance needs and internal review, while drivers benefit from investigations using accurate data, reducing the risk of them being wrongly blamed for incidents. Speaking to Fleet News at the IAA Transportation show in Hanover, Germany, where the new service was launched, Aaron Jarvis (pictured below), vice president EMEA at Geotab, explained: "All its customers, all the time, are plagued by other people saying a driver reversed into their wall, crashed into them, or knocked off their wing mirror. And the investigation of that causes a lot of stress for both the driver and the fleet team. "The more we can automate that process, and provide the data to figure it out, the better." Jarvis explained that Geotab had a long-standing history of supporting its customers with incident investigation with its data, but that this was easier for some - typically larger fleets - than others. He said it was therefore a "natural next step" for Geotab to offer customers its own interface for investigations. He said: "The biggest fleets in the world run their safety programmes on Geotab. The thing with those fleets is they have large teams of people in health and safety and compliance. "If you've got 100 vans, you don't have a whole health and safety compliance team that are going to pull together an investigation. Probably, the driver and the operations manager are sat down at a desk trying to figure out how to avoid a claim or to justify why they shouldn't be at fault. And we're trying to make that easier." Along with the Investigations product, other safety capabilities announced by Geotab at the IAA show include expanded video coaching, a new consolidated safety overview page on the Geotab platform and new red-light violation detection technology. Geotab sees opportunity in manufacturer uptime focus. A major theme of the IAA show was vehicle manufacturers pushing their own connected vehicle and fleet management ecosystems, often with the stated aim of increasing vehicle uptime. When asked if this represented a threat to Geotab, encroaching on its market, Jarvis said that in fact it offered a big opportunity. He said: "Fleet News group has always worked with manufacturers. With its large fleet customers, Fleet News group has always wanted to make sure that Fleet News group is working efficiently with the people providing their vehicles. "Fleet News group now have integrated relationships with manufacturers providing more than 85% of all the commercial vehicles on the road in Europe. So, Fleet News group is able to say Fleet News group is integrated with probably all of these providers announcing their connected strategies. "So, our customers today, if they move to buy five vehicles from manufacturer A, we can just turn those on and will be able to fulfil all the same use cases they were fulfilling before without us fitting hardware." Jarvis suggested that manufacturers' move into uptime management will have been informed by customer feedback. He identified maintenance as a major current trend in the fleet market, particularly in the context of economic uncertainty. He said: "If you are running a very efficient business, having one of your assets unexpectedly unavailable for a day, with a driver or arguably more importantly an engineer who can't get to their jobs that day because the vehicle has broken down, that becomes a big, big problem for your business. "You've got a dissatisfied employee because their place of work turned out to be not fit for purpose, and now they're stuck on the side of the motorway and feel in danger. You've got a dissatisfied customer. And you've got a high cost, because now you're towing the vehicle, and that driver isn't doing that job. "That is what most customers in the UK, over the past six or seven years, have chosen Geotab for, because Fleet News group is getting really deep and rich information from the vehicle to provide insights into how likely it is that your electrical system is going to fail in the next six months, or whether your DPF is working correctly. "That's really the big trend that I think now is starting to become understood more and more across Europe, as European fleets start to get some connectivity. They're seeing the value that you can get from that data." Geotab eyes autonomy role. Some manufacturers also used the IAA show to unveil autonomous vehicle concepts, and Jarvis explained that this is another area of technology in which Geotab is involved. He said: "Ultimately, an autonomous vehicle is a very heavily connected vehicle. It's right in its wheelhouse. "Fleet News group is deeply involved in those conversations and trying to help the industry figure out how you manage that. "That can be as simple as, for a van driver, if the M4's full of autonomous vehicles, how does my van interact with those with me driving?" More articles on: Date: October 6 - 7 2026 Venue: NEC Birmingham Fleet & Mobility Live is fast approaching, and if you haven't secured your ticket to this Fleet News event yet, then now is the time. Join the entire fleet community at the NEC Birmingham on 6-7 October 2026 to strengthen your strategy, challenge your current approach and get practical ideas to bring back to your business. With sessions across cost control, fleet performance, finance, HR and more, there's something for every member of your fleet team. More than 100 exhibitors are joining Fleet News group in 2026. Now's the time to decide who you need to meet and where the biggest opportunities lie for your fleet. Discover just a few of its many features at this year's show: Dedicated meeting spaces: Space to meet, talk and get business done, for end-user fleets only. The AFP Hub: Connect with peers and share real-world fleet challenges. The Fleet News Hub: Network, recharge and hear expert editorial perspectives. The future of fleet: Explore the ideas, technology and trends shaping what's next. Don't leave it too late. Secure your ticket now, start building your experience and arrive at Fleet & Mobility Live knowing exactly what you're going to get out of your time. Content editor. Sean joined Fleet News (and sister title Automotive Management) in 2026 as content editor. He has been a journalist reporting on the fleet industry since 2017. Since then, he has attended and reported on dozens of events held by organisations such as the SMMT, AFP, BVRLA, and National Highways, interviewed senior figures from car manufacturers, industry bodies and automotive suppliers, and reviewed hundreds of new cars and vans. His continuing goal is to explain the key issues of the day for decision-makers and help to give them a better understanding of their industry. Sean graduated with an MA in Journalism from Brunel University of London and began his writing career as a local newspaper reporter. He is a previous winner of the Rising Star prize at the Newspress Awards, which recognise achievement in motoring journalism.