Freight forwarding post digitisation

Don’t write off ‘digital freight forwarders’ – look and learn from them

It happened again, last week.
Digitally native forwarder Beacon announced a funding round, accompanied by familiar claims of disrupting the trillion-dollar freight industry.
And while the logistics industry certainly has room to advance, the announcement also brought a familiar indignant response. The reality, of course, is more nuanced.
On the one hand, there’s no such thing as a tech company anymore. Every company, big or small, has made technology a central part of …

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https://theloadstar.com/dont-write-off-digital-freight-forwarders-look-and-learn-from-them/

BIFA bites back at ‘rubbish’ prophecies of forwarders’ death-by-tech

Digital disruptors will no more kill-off today’s forwarding sector than the advent of European rail did in the 1800s, according to director general of the British International Freight Association (BIFA), Robert Keen.
Mr Keen said it was simply “PR puff” to claim, as new ‘digital’ forwarder Beacon did yesterday, that the acceleration of digitalisation resulting from Covid-19 makes the future of the traditional freight forwarder more ‘precarious’ than ever.
“Over the past …

The post BIFA bites...

https://theloadstar.com/bifa-bites-back-at-rubbish-prophecies-of-forwarders-death-by-tech/

Beacon will disrupt ‘slow and inefficient’ forwarding market with Bezos cash

A new UK ‘digital’ forwarder, hoping to disrupt the industry’s “precarious” traditional methods, has received the ultimate accolade: investment from Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
London-based Beacon, which styles itself as a “next-generation freight forwarding and supply chain finance company”, has raised $15m in series A funding, luring in not just Mr Bezos, but venture capital firm 8VC.
Beacon was founded in 2018 by two former Uber executives, Fraser Robinson, now CEO, and …

The post Beacon will...

https://theloadstar.com/beacon-will-disrupt-slow-and-inefficient-forwarding-market-with-bezos-cash/

Slowly, but surely, ‘digital’ and ‘traditional’ forwarders are getting closer

Incumbent forwarders with an interest in obscuring transparency have played a role in slowing efforts to digitalise the industry, according to Martin Ring, global chief operations officer for Damco.  
“There are forces in the industry that might not have had a great interest in accelerating digitalisation,” he told event group eft. 
“That’s what they made a living out of – making the complicated understandable. And of course, when you see more digitilisation, you get more transparency and more...

https://theloadstar.com/slowly-but-surely-digital-and-traditional-forwarders-are-getting-closer/

More air and sea carriers take the digital plunge to offer online freight booking

The transport industry – particularly air and sea – has taken one step further towards online pricing, and a subsequently improved relationship with forwarders, according to carriers.
Cargosphere has launched eSUDS Connector, a universal rate structure and API (application programming interface) for ocean carriers to offer digital rate distribution to customers.
The connector enables shipping lines to transfer confidential customer contracts, amendments and global surcharge tariffs to the...

https://theloadstar.com/more-air-and-sea-carriers-take-the-digital-plunge-to-offer-online-freight-booking/

Freight forwarding post-digitisation: how to succeed

The adoption of online quoting and booking platforms by freight forwarders is becoming more mainstream by the day. The promise of increased efficiencies to free up the workforce to focus on other value-add tasks is a compelling argument.
But how do you go about this in practise? As old patterns of work are rendered obsolete how should freight forwarders plot the development of their companies and their industry?
This FREE-TO-ATTEND webinar, sponsored …

The post Freight forwarding...

https://theloadstar.com/freight-forwarding-post-digitisation-how-to-succeed/