Real-time tracking and monitoring of deliveries—real-time visibility—is a market that is growing by leaps and bounds as a result of new cloud-based solutions, combined with rapidly rising expectations and demands from both businesses and consumers. The research firm Gartner refers to this hot sector as ”Real-Time Transportation Visibility Platforms” (RTTVP).
As e-commerce has grown rapidly, consumers have become accustomed to tracking the distribution of their orders step by step. Businesses now have the same expectations, which is one of the reasons for the high level of interest in real-time visibility in the supply chain. The popularity of visibility platforms has also grown in the wake of the increasing problems in global delivery flows over the past three years, and the effort to manage disruptions and deviations before they even occur.
– The market has matured, and the demand for visibility has increased significantly. The pandemic played a major role in this, as did all the disruption it caused, which increased the need to monitor and reroute shipments, says Christer Westerberg, Senior Director for the Nordics at Project44, a company founded in 2014 in Chicago that has established itself over the years as one of the market leaders in the RTTVP sector. Project44 currently has approximately 1,000 employees, 1,200 customers, and operations in fourteen countries. In Sweden, its customers include Electrolux, Atlas Copco, and two large, well-known companies in the fashion and home furnishings industries, respectively.
“Of our total of about 1,200 customers, we gained 300 new ones in 2022 alone. That’s a good indicator of just how hot this market is,” says Christer.
With a platform that provides real-time visibility into the delivery flow, businesses and consumers gain insight into what happens to their orders once they leave the sender. These platforms obtain their data through integrations—typically via API or EDI—with transportation management systems (TMS), warehouse management systems (WMS), and order management systems, as well as through direct communication with telematics solutions in vehicles, on cargo carriers, and via smartphones.
The Benefits of Real-Time Visibility
End-to-end real-time visibility has gradually become a reality as a result of the ability to cost-effectively integrate various systems using APIs (Application Programming Interface) on a shared platform, where the service is offered in the cloud and the cost is based on the number of shipments the user tracks. In addition, increasingly affordable telematics solutions have been developed—such as IoT transmitters and GPS equipment on trucks and containers—which have further driven this development. But what concrete business benefits do cargo owners and their customers derive from this real-time visibility?
– By gaining visibility into their entire transportation flow, disruptions and deviations can be anticipated and managed before they occur, which has a positive impact on availability, customer service, and costs, and creates the conditions for better transportation planning based on historical data. The platforms also provide insight into CO2 emissions, which are measured and displayed in the systems, driving both climate-smart choices among cargo owners and investments in more climate-smart vehicles and ships among carriers, explains Christer, adding that in the fall of 2022, project44 began rolling out a new version of its platform, called Movement.
“With Movement, we’ve brought our entire product suite together on a unified platform where supply chain partners can collaborate to address discrepancies, streamline deliveries, automate manual processes, and resolve issues—all on a single platform,” says Christer, emphasizing that the new solution provides global visibility at the order level and across all modes of transport.
The upcoming issue of Supply Chain Effect (#1 2023) will provide an in-depth look at and description of the market for RTTVP, or Real-Time Transportation Visibility Platforms.
