Our CEO's Look Ahead to 2024...

As many years prior, 2023 was a whirlwind across the supply chain. In this blog, I have put together some of Loadsmart's key highlights from the year behind us, as well as my thoughts on what to expect in the year to come.

A few key highlights from 2023 include the following milestones:

First AI Solution to Shippers

Loadsmart launched the first shipper facing generative AI solution in the industry, Co-pilot AI, in June 2023, which helps Shippers navigate their data using plain text prompts and easily to digest tables and visualizations. 

LTL Platform

In 2023, we heavily invested in our LTL technology, allowing shippers to have instant access to LTL rates from their current providers or new entrants. We believe our platform for LTL quoting, booking and execution is now within the top five in the industry!

Managed Transportation Bundling: Services + Tech 

To create a comprehensive Managed Transporation solutions for our mid-size shippers, we have combined our transportation expertise services with our user-friendly tech solutions (including our NextGen TMS, Dock Scheduling Software). Shippers no longer need to procure and hire different tech solutions, a system implementation company and a 4PL to manage it all. Our Managed Transportation solution offers a full service + tech bundle, making it easier and faster for mid-size shippers to outsource their transportation management.

Opendock’s Gate Management and APIs

We launched our gate management solution integrated with Opendock, allowing warehouses to manage the inbound and outbound of trucks more efficiently and with less paperwork. Opendock also saw a huge increase in its dock appointment API usage for both shippers and carriers, and it is now fully integrated with ShipperGuide TMS.

Yard Management Computer Vision 
In 2023, we acquired NavTrac, a company focused on building Computer Vision AI solutions to identify and track assets (trailers, tractors) via video cameras. Imagine everything today that needs a combination of human eyes and manual data entry. All of that can be improved, or automated, with this computer vision software.

Now looking forward to 2024...

Shipper Facing AI Solutions:

AI still has huge potential to benefit shippers and carriers. While Brokers, 3PLs and other service providers talk about AI in the context of internal operational efficiency, in all honesty shippers couldn’t care less. Very few companies currently offer shipper-facing AI solutions. We’ll continue to lead the industry in that direction, launching another robust AI solution tailored for shippers very soon. Stay tuned.

FinTech & Transportation:

The way shippers pay, and carriers get paid, is still far from ideal. Relying on legacy technology and manual interventions, the whole process is full of errors and difficult to audit. We’ll start to see several solutions that improve this process and Loadsmart will be investing heavily in advanced freight audit and payments solutions to shippers in 2024 using the latest AI technology.

Interoperability/Integration Hubs

Companies that provide managed transportation services with a poor ability to coordinate integrations, or that rely on a third party integration provider, will suffer to gain traction. At Loadsmart we continue to enhance our integration hub (“Kraken”), to make it seamless to partner with different players in the ecosystem, key to being a nimble Managed Transportation provider.

Compliance and Cyber-security

Although all enterprise shippers have at least 2-3 pages of compliance and IT obligations in their transportation contracts, there is close to zero auditing and no enforcement whatsoever. That has to change. Shippers need to be much more organized on how they select, audit, enforce and eliminate providers based on legal compliance and basic cybersecurity protections. Loadsmart has a dedicated team of lawyers and cybersecurity experts to keep your supply chain safe and secure. SOC2 compliance is also a top priority for the company in Q1/24.

Learn all about what Loadsmart has to offer 👉 loadsmart.com