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Purchasers of Qualcomm Inc.’s OmniTracs system in Washington state dodged a tax hit following a March 10 decision about the legal classification of that system by the Washington Supreme Court.

January orders for new Class 8 trucks skyrocketed 320% to 27,000 from the year-ago level, a clear sign that the industry will enjoy a stronger 2011, two research organizations said last week.

Ryder System said it will acquire The Scully Companies, a California-based provider of contract carriage and related services.

Cummins Inc. said Tuesday its third-quarter profit almost tripled, led by strong performances in its engine segment and international markets.

Garmin Ltd. recently recalled 796,000 Global Positioning System navigation units in the United States, but the company’s trucker-specific GPS navigation handheld was not affected, the company said.

Never mind the deliveries you want to make on time — the deliveries you don’t want to make at all may be the best reasons to invest in a navigation system designed specifically for commercial truck operations.

The changes the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is making to its CSA safety-monitoring system will lead to increased enforcement in the two areas that correlate least with future crash risk, an examination of the revisions has found.

Carrier earnings for the second quarter started off on a positive note last week, with truckload carrier Landstar System Inc. reporting a 37% increase in net income and J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. announcing a 52% rise in profit.

New orders for heavy-duty trucks increased 91% in April, from the same month of 2009, ACT Research Co. reported.