Much like death and taxes, there are two immutable laws in logistics. It will always be a 24/7 industry, and issues will always arise.

For that reason Loadsmart must be able to address any shipment events day and night. At the same time, great service also requires a great team who are performing at their best. This level of performance is not possible if team members can only contribute to exception resolution when they are in front of a computer.

So we built Jarvis – a mobile version of Alice, Loadsmart’s internal TMS. By offering a native mobile version of our TMS we made it possible for anyone in Loadsmart’s Operations Team to respond to issues quickly from anywhere, any time. All responsible parties can jump in to any situation to make sure our customers’ needs are met. This also allows us to keep our team smaller and more nimble, supporting our goal to move more with less.

Loadsmart has been the pioneer on mobile solutions for freight brokerage operations since its inception: from driver apps that track shipment location to apps offering one-click load booking for carriers. This time, by building a mobile version of our TMS, we better service our customers and give more freedom to our team, while keeping the company as efficient as possible.

Jarvis’ interface had to be simple, providing a clear overview of the shipments that are moving through our platform. The contact information of all stakeholders of the shipment are automatically available, in case we need to directly call or message shippers, carriers or warehouses. Each Loadsmart team member can access the app using fingerprint login in their smartphone, ensuring also security of the shipment information.

“By providing a mobile solution to our Load Management team, we are capable of notifying the right person at the right time in case of incidents that need human attention, minimizing response time and offering a better customer support to our clients with the help of technology”, said Gustavo Barbosa, Mobile Lead at Loadsmart.

Loadsmart’s mission is also to make our internal team more efficient, moving more with less.

Loadsmart was invited to speak at the Supply Chain Conference organized by the publication Automotive Logistics in Atlanta. In a panel titled “Clearing the bottlenecks”, Ricardo Salgado, Loadsmart’s CEO, and Ivan Hernandez, Daimler’s Director of Transportation for North America, co-presented a joint project which leveraged Loadsmart’s technology. The project successfully reduced Daimler’s time to execute a spot load from 5 hours to 18 minutes, while increasing Daimler utilization of their carrier customers by 70%.

Aside from Loadsmart and Daimler, the other panelists came from Honda, Toyota, Surgere, and Ryder.

See below a 4-minute excerpt of the presentation outlining the joint project:

Over the last five years, we have been obsessed with introducing new technology to dramatically improve the efficiency of the freight brokerage business. This effort not only includes creating a better experiences for shippers and carriers, but also improving and automating back-office processes.

Every broker receives thousands of documents per month related to ongoing and delivered shipments: Rate Confirmations, BOLs, PODs, Invoices, etc. Identifying, separating, cataloging and uploading each document to the right place takes countless hours, and even the most strict processes result in a non-negligible error rate.

The new feature we just released is a machine learning model that analyzes each email, its attachments, and identifies what documents are contained into a single or multiple PDF files. After automatically scanning and cataloging the content of the files, the system then splits the documents into its component sub-files (e.g. BOLs, Invoices, Rate Confirmations, etc.) and auto-uploads each document to the right shipment folder.
This new feature is saving hundreds of hours per month in document review, and it has dramatically reduced the error rate in classifying documents.

The more automated and efficient we are, the lower operational costs we have, which in turn has meant we offer more attractive prices for shippers and better margins for carriers.

 

Felipe Capella is Co-Founder of Loadsmart

Loadsmart was the first to launch truckload instant pricing/booking in the US (2015); first to launch One-Click load acceptance app for carriers (2015); first to launch instant pricing API for TMS integrations (2016) and experienced the first fully automated quote-book-source flow in the truckload spot market (2016).

We are now providing a pre-spot solution by fully automating quoting and booking of truckload shipments. By doing this, we make it possible for companies to automatically book a truck before the shipment turns into a spot load, accepting 100% of those tenders and guaranteeing capacity. This helps shippers avoid the same-day/next-day markets,  which are known for steep prices and service failures. Here is how it works.

1 – Semi-Automated Pre-Spot

We integrate with the Shipper’s transportation management system (TMS) via API to access data about all shipments that need to be moved. Loadsmart runs each shipment  through our machine learning pricing algorithm and returns a live, bookable rate directly to the Shipper’s TMS.

This allows the shipper to compare the prices from other carriers and brokers, which are logged in their static rate tree, with Loadsmart’s bookable rate. Because it is given real-time, the rate is always live and can be booked with one click. No emails; no phone calls.

That means that when the primary carrier fails, the load planner can execute the shipment right away. Not only does this provide price protection at above-standard service levels, it also creates internal efficiencies for the shipper by saving time for the planners. It goes without saying that this also allows Loadsmart to operate much more efficiently, generating further savings that can be passed along to the customer.

2- Fully Automated Pre-Spot

In a fully-automated flow, instead of the shipper’s load planner manually comparing our pre-spot dynamic prices with static rates from their routing guide, this is done automatically on a server.

There are two steps to the automated process of price discovery and comparison. First, an algorithm evaluates the acceptance rates of carriers and brokers whose static rates are in the route guide. If they have rarely or never agreed to move the load at their routing guide (or annual bid) rate, then the algorithm skips them to save time.

Second, the algorithm requests a real-time rate from the Loadsmart pricing API. It then moves down the routing guide from least expensive to most expensive rate, contacting only carriers who the shipper has reason to believe will respond. It keeps doing this until the next lowest rate is Loadsmart’s instantly bookable rate. At that point, the algorithm automatically tenders the load to Loadsmart via API.

This allows for a full automation experience that in practice reduces the time to identify and secure truckload capacity by as much as several days, increasing on-time delivery and decreasing cost of hire. Further efficiencies accrue to the shipper as either very limited or indeed no manual work is necessary, decreasing errors and human capital costs while optimizing decisions.

We have implemented both semi- and fully-automated pricing and booking  with Fortune 500 companies across the US. Pre-Spot Automation has dramatically accelerated the quoting and booking process (check Daimler’s case), slashing the time required to secure capacity, reducing rates by adding liquidity and reducing dependency on same-day spot markets, and minimizing the risk of human error.

Want to integrate with our system? Let us know.

 

Felipe Capella, Co-founder 

Hunter Yaw, Senior Product Manager

Recently, our co-founder and head of product, Felipe Capella spoke with Kevin Horek, host of Building the Future, who interviews founders at startups, entrepreneurs, investors and others helping to make the world a better place. During their conversation, Felipe discusses the evolution of Loadsmart, how an awesome team is revolutionizing the logistics industry as well as life leading up to Loadsmart. To listen to the podcast, click here.

Loadsmart has teamed up with Daimler Truck North America (DTNA) to improve its carrier customers experience by digitizing and redesigning the distribution, notification and acceptance of targeted loads. This includes an entire new experience for DTNA carrier customers to get notified and accept loads online, via Loadsmart’s web and mobile applications. The partnership also involves Loadsmart managing Daimler’s loads in the spot market as a freight broker.

A VIP experience

Rising costs, increased time pressure, the best possible utilization of capacity, and compliance with the law remain of concern to motor carriers. To help DTNA’s customers succeed commercially, the partnership enables carriers to permanently reduce operating costs as Loadsmart technology sends the most relevant business to each carrier based on advanced matching algorithms. A new, reimagined and redesigned user experience for Daimler partner carriers facilitates the interaction with the system and load-acceptance flow, with a one-click load-acceptance experience.

Loadsmart is also managing a substantial part of Daimler’s spot shipment needs. By leveraging Loadsmart’s instant pricing/booking capabilities, Daimler itself has improved its productivity, efficiency and security across the spot load value chain from start to finish.

Entering a digital era…

The Loadsmart platform leverages data and machine learning technology to provide shippers an instant pricing/ instant booking experience in which truckload shipments can be booked in a few seconds. It also analyzes thousands of data points to identify which carriers are best positioned to move each load, allowing them to accept targeted loads with one-click.

 

“To manufacture trucks, we need carriers to deliver components and parts to our plants,” said Lori Heino-Royer, director of business innovation at Daimler Trucks North America. “Offering a customized app to our contracted carriers gives them first access to our spot business and improves critical points in our supply chain.”

In addition, Felipe Capella, Co-founder, Loadsmart, explained, “Carriers and shippers are equally vital to our success. This partnership enables Daimler to support is customers post-truck sale by providing targeted business in a digitalized, easy-to-use platform. And as a shipper itself, Daimler takes advantage of our instant pricing/booking capabilities to move spot loads with ease and efficiency.”

 

… for dramatic improvements

DTNA reports that the beta test of the Loadsmart app resulted in dramatic improvements in the time to execute a spot shipment – going from five hours to just 18 minutes on average – and in load acceptance rates which increased over 50 percent. In addition, the beta period demonstrated that carriers received payments in two days instead of 30 days.

Loadsmart CEO Ricardo Salgado summarized the project results, “We saw Daimler Trucks North America’s participating fleet customers increased their average number of spot loads moved by more than 50 percent and improved their average time to accept, process and deliver a spot shipment by over 90 percent. Partnering with the largest truck OEM is core to Loadsmart’s vision on building the future of logistics by interconnecting all players in a powerful platform.”

The DTNA pilot program began in October 2017 and is currently available to the company’s select customers in the United States with plans for the company to expand it to Canada and Mexico later this year.

 

Access full DTNA’s Press Release here.

New York, NY, January 16, 2018 – Loadsmart, the logistics technology company specializing in full-truckload shipping, today announced that Joao Bosco is joining the company as chief technology officer. Bosco’s primary focus will be to further the platform’s AI capability.

Loadsmart relies on machine learning processes to enable shippers to instantly book a truck nationwide, and complex algorithms to, after shipper booking, identify the best truck positioned to move each load. As more data becomes available and volume increases, deep neural networks will positively impact the success of the right pricing and sourcing computational processes. They will also enhance Loadsmart’s internal computer generated tasks without the need for task-specific programming. Identifying potential issues before they actually happen, or are known, will be of great value in the logistics industry.

“The opportunity is enormous,” said Joao Bosco, chief technology officer, Loadsmart. “The size of the transportation and logistics industry, and fragmentation on both sides – shippers and carriers – create a huge potential for disruption with neural networks and other machine learning technologies. I am proud of joining the dream team.”

Felipe Capella, co-founder and chief product officer, Loadsmart, said, “Bosco is one of a kind. He is a successful entrepreneur, having built his company from scratch to a successful exit, and a talented manager, growing a tech team with the right culture. His many years of experience in big data and predictive AI attest to his tech capability. While his know-how will help Loadsmart improve its software development processes, he will also contribute significantly to our artificial intelligence and predictive models such as our Instant Pricing and Automated Sourcing features.”

Prior to Loadsmart, Bosco co-founded Chaordic Systems, a company focused on big data and predictive analytics counting some of Latin America’s biggest e-commerce companies as its customers. Acting as the company’s CTO, he grew the company’s tech team from zero to more than 100 developers and data scientists, earning Chaordic Systems the Best Place to Work award several times. He eventually sold the company to Linx, a public software management company out of Sao Paulo.

Bosco has a bachelor and Masters in Computer Science. He was featured in several articles, including the cover of the leading Brazilian business magazine Revista Exame.

Following on from an amazing 2017, Felipe Capella, Chief Product Officer and Loadsmart’s Co-founder, mentions the top 4 technology trends that will be the kings of 2018 in the brokerage of truckload shipping:

• Data Sharing and Open Access
  Logistics industry players have traditionally been very protective of their data. Freight brokers are the epitome of this trend, siloing all information and creating close environments for software use. In 2018 we will see more openness, with many companies in different businesses sharing data for mutual benefit. While initially this initiative will be to better understand market dynamics, it will provide a more efficient service to end clients in the long run. Software will also become more open to utilization across different platforms and fear of IP replication will give space to the distribution benefits of openness.

• APIs replace EDIs
  EDIs have to die. Information is exchanged between computers like a fax machine: as a specific event, not on an ongoing basis. This delay causes multiple operational challenges, increasing the chance of missed status changes and precluding the automation of manual-intense processes such as calls and emails. Companies that want to embrace automation and integration with tech partners have to build proper APIs that are easy to use and easy to maintain.

• Instant Pricing/Booking
  Instant and on-demand features will start claiming a bigger portion of the industry. Traditional shippers are starting to move towards a more connected and immediate electronic and digitized response to their spot and contracted business needs. Speed, reliability and just-in-time are needs that modern shippers have, which will make instant truck booking an essential technology.

• Deep Neural Networks: beyond pricing and sourcing
  Loadsmart relies on machine learning processes and complex algorithms to allow instantly booking of a truck and to identify the best truck positioned to move each load after the booking the shipment. As more data becomes available and volume increases, deep neural networks will claim a bigger part of the success on the right pricing and sourcing computational-processes. But more importantly, these neuron-mimicking flows will also change repetitive human responsibilities to computer generated tasks (without the need for task-specific programming). Identifying potential issues before they actually happen – or are known – will be of great value in the logistics industry.

Do you agree? What trends do you see for 2018?

Trucking is one of the nation’s largest workforces, employing more than 3.5 million drivers. In 2017, trucks transported 10 billion tons of freight, which equals 70% of all domestic freight tonnage. And it’s only to be expected to increase in 2018. Needless to say, we have exciting times ahead of us.

Before we jump into 2018, let’s take a moment to review our year and some of our amazing accomplishments – none of which would have been possible without our customers and the Loadsmart team.

Loadsmart’s revenue grew by 150% in 2017 which was the culmination of a number of factors. We on-boarded Anheuser-Busch and Albertsons / Safeway among other Fortune 500 companies by offering instant rates for around 900,000 lanes.

Technology wise we made great strides as we enhanced our machine learning pricing algorithm in August to version 2.0. We also re-wrote all Instant Loads infrastructure – allowing carriers to accept loads with one click – and launched the Instant Loads app for Android and iOS: carriers now have visibility on all available loads and can book them from their mobile devices. Last but not least, we put our Pricing API to use and are conducting integration pilots with several leading companies. Watch this space in 2018!

Another significant update was the launch of a Human Trafficking Tip line on our truck-driver mobile app, enabling  users to connect with The National Human Trafficking Hotline to provide tips, seek services, request help or alert authorities.

No need to say all these developments had a positive effect on the team and the company. We doubled our engineering team and implemented a new brand look & feel in September.

Last but not least, we received two amazing industry accolades. The team won the Bronze Stevie Award for Most Innovative Tech Company of the Year – Up to 100 Employees, and we ended the year with a bang, winning the DOGA Design Award for User Interaction Design – underscoring our very belief that great unity of design and technology is the path to introduce technology in well-established industries.

Again, a big shoutout to all our customers, partners and the Loadsmart team. We’re very grateful and look forward to an even more exciting 2018!