Supply chain

By connecting to forwarder-customers of software vendor e2open, Freightos is continuing its push to develop electronic booking capability in the air freight industry.

A dearth of consolidation means there are still plenty of visibility vendors for shippers to choose from, but it also means the market as a whole is on somewhat unsteady ground.

Brokers would have to make transaction records, including shipper rates, available to trucking companies electronically and the requirements could supersede non-disclosure agreements, according to a proposed rule from the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.

GenLogs, founded by an ex-counterterrorism expert, is offering shippers and brokers a way to track lost trailers and trucks as cargo theft booms in the US.

The company has the largest ground transportation fleet in Asia, with more than 86,000 trucks and 100,000 first- and last-mile delivery vehicles.

Sean Duffy is the incoming administration’s pick for transportation secretary, with much of his prior legislative focus on issues related to trucking.

The New York Shipping Exchange’s plan to introduce indexes to support long-term contracts adds to an already crowded field of providers.

The company sees its new Broker Access product as another channel for brokers to find capacity outside of contracts with truckload carriers and posting spot freight on a load board.

The deal for privately-owned IMC Logistics gives NVO Kuehne+Nagel a significant advantage in selling door-to-door products to cargo owners.

Developing an over-the-road network to handle containers carried on ships too large to traverse the waterway could increase the canal’s annual throughput by over 60%, officials say, although funding concerns exist.

Customers of automated freight procurement tool Keelvar will get access to more than $1 trillion in truckload pricing data as part of a new arrangement with DAT Freight & Analytics.

The Democrat, appointed under the previous Trump administration, had taken a particular interest in port and terminal operations while at the US maritime regulator.

Volume and rates on the Asian export corridors to the US and Europe have been high all year and online shopping promotions in November are further stoking the market.

Advisors to beneficial cargo owners say mitigating future supply chain disruptions requires BCOs to proactively engage with ocean carriers and forwarders, seeking to build partnerships even if past experience suggests they end in disappointment.

A slower-than-expected transition to renewable energy sources is augmenting — rather than replacing — investment in traditional oil and gas, boosting project cargo demand.

Shippers once saw small variances on freight bills as a nuisance too insignificant to dispute, but technology is enabling more efficient scrutiny across transportation modes.

Some freight brokers are increasing the number of loads they can book per day with software that automates repetitive components of the booking process.

The recent rise in volume to Europe contrasts sharply with China-to-US tonnage that in the second half has fallen far below year-over-year levels following greater scrutiny by US authorities on e-commerce imports.

Jens Lund this week emphasized the earnings potential of the takeover, pointing to greater scale and a wider portfolio of services that would increase the combined entity’s reach.

The agency said it has secured more refunds and waivers for shippers in disputes with ocean carriers over detention and demurrage charges, with more investigations pending.

It’s not too soon for BCOs to begin game-planning for the results of the US presidential election and what a slew of new tariffs in a possible Trump administration could mean for importers, writes shipper consultant John McCauley.

Small farmers of commodities such as palm oil or cocoa remain concerned about the demanding traceability requirements of the regulation that is seen as a barrier to trade with the European Union.

The US Department of Transportation’s latest round of infrastructure grants also target port-adjacent roadways, berth expansions and yard equipment electrification.

The test showed that eBLs sped the transfer of documents from the exporter to the importer using the WaveBL platform as a shared ledger.

The country could be on the verge of undoing legislation that abolished cabotage restrictions, saying the boost received by foreign-flag carriers has come at the expense of local shipping interests.

Despite its brevity, shippers can expect to see ongoing impacts on tonnage supply on some trade lanes from the Oct. 1-3 strike, Lars Jensen told the South Carolina International Trade Conference.

If ports operated by ILA labor were for decades a dependable alternative to those reliant on the ILA’s perpetually disruptive West Coast counterpart, the ILWU, that assumption no longer holds true, writes Peter Tirschwell.

Last week’s three-day longshore strike on the East and Gulf coasts is not expected to disrupt transportation supply chains ahead of the traditional beginning of the holiday shopping season, the National Retail Federation said.

Market participants yearning for a market where adverse events never lead to major supply chain hiccups are essentially asking for a reality that has never existed, writes Lars Jensen.

Refrigerated container shippers using US East and Gulf coast ports are tapping some non-unionized terminals, but they fear produce stuck on ships and in ports will spoil, and equipment will become scarcer if the strike lasts longer than a week.

Several groups are calling on the White House to invoke the Taft-Hartley Act to stop the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) strike that began on Tuesday at midnight.

Container lines are contracting directly with perishables shippers, undercutting volume brokers, but the specialized reefer fleet is hanging on to niche markets as a handful of ports pivot toward dockside cold storage.

The White House may finally be looking to take a firmer hand in stalled talks between the ILA and maritime employers with an expected strike just days away.

The lobby group representing ocean carriers in issues involving containers failed in its bid to further delay new rules covering how per diem bills are handled.

The integration of two large companies in similar industries is “particularly challenging,” according to Tobias Meyer, who withdrew DHL’s interest in DB Schenker earlier this year.

The Biden administration may have no choice but to invoke the Taft-Hartley Act to stop a US port strike even as broader support for Democrats among transportation unions falters ahead of the presidential election.

GenLogs, a technology provider aiming to help US brokers track trucks, uses a network of roadside sensors to passively collect truckload carrier locations.

Brokers looking to tap into the booming US-Mexico trade now have a tool to serve shipper requests to handle cross-border truckload moves.

The software provider has steered clear of outside investment as it sought to patiently build import management tools for shippers.

Under the spotlight at MEPC 82 are midterm measures consisting of a technical element to reduce GHG intensity of fuels and a pricing mechanism to narrow the gap between fossil and green fuel.