by Mike King, Lloyd’s Loading List / Platform will provide web-based load-matching service for 25,000 Schenker-approved European land transport ‘partners’, including carrier reviews, pricing, quote comparisons, ‘and complete transport monitoring’ /
DB Schenker has signed a five-year partnership agreement for exclusive collaboration in Europe with US-based online freight shipping marketplace uShip to create a platform providing a web-based load-matching service for 25,000 Schenker-approved European land transport “partners”, including carrier reviews, pricing, quote comparisons, “and complete transport monitoring”.
The European forwarding and logistics giant declined to clarify how much it would spend setting up its new suite of mobile digital services with uShip, but said it “had invested millions” and the deal would eventually be worth “tens of millions”.
The uShip marketplace platform, which Schenker claimed had been successful at matching shippers with carriers in over 19 countries, enables freight transport decisions and transactions via mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets and will initially be rolled out across DB Schenker’s European land transport division.
“We are getting a proved and tested technique, which especially works very well with mobile devices, while we provide the carrier-network,” a spokesperson told Lloyd’s Loading List. “The cooperation enables us to be a lot faster, since we don’t have to develop software but can use a very good one on the market.”
The goal of the partnership, according to Schenker, is to harness new digital innovations that get freight moving faster and more efficiently, helping optimize services for customers and partners.
Starting in late 2016, the company will launch its own ‘Drive4Schenker’ online platform, which will use the uShip software platform to match drivers and cargo, enabling some 25,000 Schenker-approved transport partners to find additional cargo along their routes in real time.
‘Drive4Schenker’ will start in Germany and other selected European countries, with the entire European land transport network to be integrated step by step. For shipping customers, the uShip PRO platform will be used to offer faster services matching available transport orders and freight capacity in real-time, including on secondary routes.
“The result will be smart, real-time web-based management of all the types of freight in European land transport, across all the stations transport orders pass through,” said Schenker. “Carrier reviews, pricing, quote comparisons and complete transport monitoring and processing will also be included.”
Ewald Kaiser, DB Schenker’s CEO for Europe and board member for Land Transport, added: “As the market leader in European land transport, we want to tap the potential we have for greater efficiency and further optimize our unique land transport network for the benefit of both our customers and our carriers.”
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