Two brothers who created an anti-theft motorbike tracker have turned their solution into a startup

When brothers Nathan and Trent Torkar went looking for affordable and reliable ways to protect their motorbikes from theft, they couldn’t find a solution.

So they decided to invent one using a portable GPS tracker. The result is their security startup Solid GPS, which works on everything from bikes to cars, trailers and caravans, helping people find their vehicle if it’s stolen.

Nathan said motorcycles are really hard to protect because thieves can simply pick it up and take it away.

Trent and Nathan Torkar, co-founders of Solid GPS

“This leaves a lot of motorcycle owners feeling unprotected, and we felt the same. At the beginning we researched a lot of product options but kept coming up short with products either way too expensive or simply not practical,” he said.

“We realised we were going to have to develop our own and that’s how Solid GPS was born. Trent is a software developer and designed the tracker himself and we’re now making a business out of it thanks to booming demand.”

They’ve built the Solid GPS wireless trackers in Australia, making them simple to use, robust and compatible with any vehicle or asset.

It has a battery life of 3-6 months (depending on how often it emits a signal), using a SIM card that works with more than 550 networks globally. Most importantly, the compact design is easily concealed from thieves.

Owners can track their vehicle (or other item) to within 5-metres of its location via an app and online dashboard, and the information can be shared with police.

The Solid GPS tracker costs $147 for the tracker with a $7 monthly tracking fee.

Nathan said they’ve already attracted a wide range of customers, including Ecycle Solutions, which uses the smart trackers to audit its waste collection, and United Star Resources, which uses Solid GPS to ship its treated electrical waste overseas to Japan and other countries for recycling.

“We started selling our trackers online at the beginning of 2020, and since then we’ve had sales double every month as more people find out about us online and hear through word-of-mouth,” he said.

” The cost of losing a motorcycle or car isn’t just monetary, but also sentimental for a lot of people. We’ve also secured partnerships with businesses who need high-end tracking for their equipment, shipments and/or electrical recycling waste. There’s a lot of industries our GPS trackers could help with that we’re still yet to explore which is really exciting.”

The short-term goal for the Torkars is to make Solid GPS Australia’s go-to provider for smart GPS tracking for individuals and businesses, and later on scale internationally.