IN BRIEF: New Services & Solutions-September 2021

Technology

• CPG and brand manufacturers can more accurately predict supply chain trends with developer Deacom’s enhanced enterprise resource planning (ERP) system. Its new forecasting methods allow users to take into consideration market volatility by weighing specific variables, measuring short-term demands, and applying multiple variables to a forecast.
• FourKites, a real-time supply chain visibility platform, released new capabilities designed to help shippers, carriers, and brokers more quickly collaborate to reduce supply chain costs and increase on-time delivery performance. For instance, its Instant Messenger’s extended capabilities let shippers chat directly with brokers and carriers to share information and resolve issues in real time.
• Cargo airlines can now track the status and location of each piece of a shipment throughout its journey with Unisys’ new software functionality. Integrated with the Unisys Cargo Core application, the new piece-level tracking functionality enables airlines to improve the operational efficiency of cargo shipments.
• Google Ventures-backed Orbital Insight launched Supply Chain Intelligence, which combines AI and multi-source data to help companies map their supply chains. The new tool detects logistical links between factories, farms, suppliers, stores, and distribution facilities—both their own and their competitors’, upstream and downstream.
• Contract manufacturers and co-packers can quickly respond to customer orders and allocate labor and capacity against fluctuating consumer demand with Nulogy’s Production Scheduling Solution. The real-time visualization tool lets companies assess and optimize their production schedules based on various factors, such as order promise date, planned downtimes, changeovers, and labor and material availability.
• Software company Axele updated Axele TMS. The new release adds ELD integrations, rate confirmation data extraction from trucking companies, driver safety improvements, and new mapping and routing tools. The system can split loads multiple times, providing reference numbers following each split.
• Odyssey Logistics & Technology launched the Odyssey Cloverleaf Program, which helps shippers and carriers advance sustainability initiatives by leveraging technology to uncover ways to reduce carbon emissions and costs, improve margins, and better serve supply chain stakeholders. Components of the program include calculating emissions and other key metrics in real time using data collection tools as well as generating recommendations for day-to-day operations and long-range planning.
• Logistics provider cargo-partner extended its air charter services between Asia and Europe until the end of 2021. Services include Hong Kong to Budapest routes, as well as weekly charter flights from Frankfurt to Zhengzhou and back.
• Ryder System expanded Ryder Last Mile, its customizable, multi-tiered delivery solution for big and bulky goods. With new hubs in Milwaukee and Philadelphia, the service covers the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, and Upper Midwest regions.
• APM Terminals in Mobile, Alabama, is supporting import cargo from Asia to the U.S. Midwest with daily departures using five Class 1 railroads that offer access to the U.S. heartland. For companies looking to transload Midwest cargo or deliver containers to local distribution centers, APM Terminals Mobile has an average waiting time of seven minutes for truckers to enter the terminal, with a total turn time of 51 minutes once in the terminal.

Services

• Old Dominion Freight Line increased its service center network with six new and expanded facilities. It introduced new service centers in Benicia, California; Phoenixville, Pennsylvania; and Kenosha, Wisconsin, and relocated and/or expanded three facilities in Colorado Springs, Colorado; Milford, Connecticut; and Warren, Ohio.
• DHL Supply Chain, the contract logistics provider within Deutsche Post DHL Group, is building an approximately 344,000-square-foot logistics center in Florstadt, Germany. Located north of Frankfurt am Main and scheduled to open in late 2021, the center expands the current capacity of the multi-user campus for pharmaceuticals and medical products in Florstadt and will service markets across Europe.
• 3PL Romark Logistics expanded its Hazleton, Pennsylvania, distribution facility to 712,026 square feet. The renovation included a conversion to a more flexible very-narrow-aisle rack layout.
• PackDash, a 3PL for small to mid-sized e-commerce companies, moved its headquarters from Chicago and established a West Coast delivery operation in Tucson, Arizona.
• Confidex’s new Ironside Plate offers durable visual marking and encasing for track-and-trace applications. The IP68-rated RAIN RFID tag identifies assets, equipment, and products no matter where they are, both by RFID reader interrogation and manually with its laser-engraved visual marks that are legible even in harsh, industrial environments.

Products

• Forward Lift is making it easier for materials handlers, manufacturers, and logistics operators to service their forklifts and pallet movers with a new line of frame-engaging mobile column lift adapter kits for use on Forward’s mobile column lifts. The attachments allow workers to more easily lift and service a range of forklifts, such as reach trucks and pallet trucks.
• Linde Material Handling released a new product: the Linde MT18 electric pallet truck. The pallet truck provides a lightweight lithium-ion option to help operations run longer. It offers a load capacity of 4,000 pounds. Weighing 374 pounds, it is tailored for light to medium-duty operations.
• XZ Series Lift Tables from Presto ECOA feature platforms that sit just 3/8 inch above the floor. This extreme low height allows loads to be rolled on or off of them with a hand pallet jack, making them ideal for facilities without a forklift, or for use in fork-free designated areas.
• Handheld Group’s RS60 ring scanner is a hands-free scanning solution for warehouses, retail stores, distribution centers, and other applications requiring mobile scanning. It can be worn on either the right or left hand, featuring a 2D-imager that captures barcodes on the move.
• The PalletPal Inverter from Southworth inverts fully loaded pallets in a matter of seconds, providing an alternative to manual restacking, which requires workers to bend, reach, and lift heavy loads.
• The recently upgraded Sure Sort small-item robotic sorting system from OPEX can now accommodate taller items, such as a standard shoe box, with an increased height capability of 6 inches. Processing up to 2,400 items per hour, Sure Sort directs a wide range of items, including cylindrical, clear, plastic bagged, and blister pack items weighing less than 5 pounds each.

Transportation

• Dachser Argentina, a subsidiary of Dachser, enhanced its door-to-door service by providing trucks and semi-trailers equipped with satellite tracking devices for cargo in and out of Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay. The door-to-door service includes direct deliveries, guaranteed departures, and proof of delivery.
• Maersk established its first inland container depot (ICD) in Russia. Near the Port of Novorossiysk, Maersk’s ICD operates two rail services and adds storage and cross-dock capacity, with annual turnover expected to reach 25,000 containers.
• OOCL Logistics and OOCL launched a multimodal container service from China to the U.S. East Coast. The offering combines the China-Europe block train service from Xian to Kaliningrad, Russia, with onward feeder to Bremerhaven, Germany, and then with OOCL ocean services from Bremerhaven to various ports on the U.S. East Coast, including New York, Savannah, and Charleston.
• Outrider now offers automated tractor-trailer hitching capabilities for distribution yards. The Outrider System uses advanced perception, motion planning, and proprietary control algorithms to hitch and unhitch its autonomous yard trucks from trailers with precision in order to move them to and from parking spots and dock doors at distribution centers.