The unsung FreightTech disrupters innovating supply chains

In the world of logistics, where precision reigns supreme, unsung innovators quietly transform supply chains. Driven by a common goal to enhance the supply chain experience for shippers, these providers represent the essence of FreightTech.

Here we review three of these providers. One empowers shippers with data-driven procurement and carrier analytics, streamlining the details of logistics. Another focuses on automating customer service support, benefiting both consumers and service reps. Lastly, a company simplifies the onboarding of transportation providers by enhancing the electronic data interchange (EDI) process, facilitating network expansion.

These innovators work diligently behind the scenes to reshape how goods leave your docks and end up on your customers’ doorsteps.

GoodShip

GoodShip, a cloud-based procurement platform, has revolutionized shippers’ supply chains with its data-driven approach. In May, the company announced the successful closure of a $5 million seed round, co-led by Ironspring Ventures and Chicago Ventures, along with participation from previous investors including Fuse VC, Cercano Management and project44’s Jett McCandless.

What sets GoodShip apart is its commitment to providing a comprehensive and neutral platform for shippers and carriers. Unlike some procurement platforms that facilitate transactions, GoodShip’s primary focus is on delivering data analytics and insights into shippers’ individual procurement ecosystems.

Ryan Soskin, the CEO and co-founder of GoodShip, emphasizes the company’s dedication to pure technology, stating that it does not engage in physical logistics but rather creates a collaborative environment where shippers and carriers can access modern analytics, essentially creating a single source of truth for benchmarking against the industry as a whole.

One of the standout features of GoodShip’s platform is its ability to offer real-time metrics and insights. Shippers and carriers can access critical information such as lane volume, total revenue, tender acceptance rates and on-time delivery percentages. Additionally, the platform provides market transparency by offering seasonality trends, volume analysis by day of the week and pricing analytics, integrating FreightWaves SONAR and Truckstop’s Rate Insights tool for even more comprehensive data.

What also makes GoodShip unique is its gamification of the procurement process. Shippers can easily identify areas that need attention and improvement by color-coding lanes. Green lanes signify competitive capacity purchasing, while red lanes indicate opportunities for rate negotiation and cost savings.

According to the company, after just six months of using GoodShip, customers have reported significant improvements, with late deliveries decreasing by 20% and freight costs dropping by 3% to 5%.

In a world where resilience and agility are paramount for supply chain success, GoodShip is transforming the way shippers and carriers collaborate, optimize their operations and navigate the complexities of the modern freight ecosystem. With continued investments from industry leaders and a clear commitment to delivering value, GoodShip is poised to remain an essential disrupter in the FreightTech space.

“All of our shipper customers have a single source of truth as we unify their data across their whole technology ecosystem,” said Soskin. “By bringing everything together in one place, shippers can contextualize what’s going on in their supply chain and be able to collaborate with their carriers, improving their performance over time.”

Kodif

Kodif’s customer support program’s success is backed by the experience and expertise of its founding team.

Norm Usenkanov, chief technology officer, worked at Uber for five years as an engineering manager, where he developed a similar tool. Founder Marat Gaipov, with his background as a lead front-end engineer at Amazon, brings a deep understanding of customer experience. 

CEO Chyngyz Dzhumanazarov, with a venture capital background, and founder Mike Zayonc, who established Plug and Play’s Supply Chain and Logistics innovation program in 2017, have a shared passion for eliminating industry hurdles associated with adopting emerging AI technologies.

Kodif offers two core products that leverage generative AI: the AI Agent Assistant and the Customer Facing Self-Service platform. Together, these solutions use conversational AI to efficiently respond to customer requests and queries, addressing up to 80% of common inquiries. Also, the AI Agent Assistant can provide valuable insights through analytics, helping businesses enhance customer satisfaction.

Contrary to the misconception that AI threatens human jobs, Kodif’s low-code approach and user-friendly interface enhance employee knowledge. By training agents in real time to respond in a brand’s unique voice, the AI Agent Assistant improves both agent and customer experiences.

Kodif has already made a significant impact in the e-commerce sector, partnering with brands like Reserve Bar, Nom Nom, Byte, Yummy and Good Eggs. By automating complex and repetitive tasks, such as refunds and credits, Kodif helped Good Eggs achieve a 40% improvement in average handle time and a 10% boost in customer satisfaction scores.

Beyond e-commerce, Kodif is exploring partnerships with transportation providers and other entities handling substantial volumes of customer service requests.

“Given our team’s entrepreneurial background and executive technical experience from Uber and Amazon, we are constantly evolving our product to meet customer requirements,” Zayonc told FreightWaves. “We are also constantly monitoring retail and logistics industry use cases to ensure our customers can benefit from the newest advances in automation and generative AI.”

Orderful

Founded in 2017 by CEO Erik Kiser, Orderful has quickly become a  player in the industry, facilitating seamless EDI integrations between supply chain actors. 

In November 2021, the company announced the successful closure of a $19 million Series B funding round led by GLP Capital Partners, with participation from Andreessen Horowitz and Initialized Capital. It has raised over $32 million to date.

While larger firms in the logistics industry are gradually adopting application programming interfaces (APIs) for data exchange, many players continue to rely on EDI for communication. Orderful recognized the need to provide a platform that caters to both traditional EDI users and those transitioning to APIs.

Unlike the lengthy and complex onboarding processes typically associated with EDI, Orderful streamlines the experience, allowing logistics providers and their customers to connect quickly and efficiently.

Often these connections involve weeks of manual coordination and data format adjustments. However, massive accounts like Koch Industries, Albertsons, Aldi, Walmart, Fanatics, Dollar General, and over 1,000 other shippers and logistics providers have reduced onboarding times from weeks or months to minutes.

“Koch Industries had to onboard 500 carriers onto a new TMS their team built in-house,” Kiser told FreightWaves of his customer’s experience. “The result was incredible. Together we were able to onboard more than 500 trading partners in 12 months, reduce their EDI costs by 80%, consolidate what was bespoke EDI into a single platform and reduce their ongoing maintenance of EDI down to one developer.”

The company plans to develop more products that facilitate carriers’ network expansions and help enterprises grow their carrier connections.

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Source: freightwaves - The unsung FreightTech disrupters innovating supply chains
Editor: Grace Sharkey