Tech roundup: digital marketplaces expanding for trailers, maintenance

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Updated Feb 26, 2020
After launching in Montreal, vHub’s collaborative trailer renting marketplace has come to the United StatesAfter launching in Montreal, vHub’s collaborative trailer renting marketplace has come to the United States

CCJ’s weekly roundup of technology news has detected new advancements in online marketplaces that go beyond freight matching to include trailer rentals and vehicle maintenance.

For freight matching, global third-party logistics provider Coyote Logistics has expanded its CoyotoGO digital freight platform with new, “on-demand” features for shippers to speed transactions from obtaining quotes through settlements. The platform also has new updates for the carrier app and desktop interface.

Shippers using the platform have new quote and ship tools that give on-demand access to a marketplace of more than 70,000 vetted carriers for moving truckload and less-than-truckload freight. The new tools include:

  • Instant quoting and shipping
  • Visibility to in-transit loads with online tracking
  • Fast settlement with the ability to receive paperwork and invoices
  • Transparency of facility ratings with nearly 200,000 reviews

Putting trailers to use

With an industry average of roughly 3:1 trailer-to-tractor ratio, a significant amount of trailer capacity is unused and available. Just as Airbnb created a new digital marketplace for renting available real estate, vHub has launched a collaborative trailer repositioning and sharing marketplace.

The company’s new online service is available for private fleets, for-hire carriers, trailer rental companies and OEMs. vHub says its marketplace cuts down trailer repositioning costs and turns unused trailers into revenue generating equipment by making them available to short-term renters in a digital community.

In the metropolitan Montreal market, where vHub was launched, its community has now registered over 5,000 trailers and has booked more than 20,000 rental days of trailer usage.

Matches can be sorted by location, routes and destinations, and the number of rental days that a trailer is needed or available. The platform showcases all trailers that are available for one-way and round-trip rentals. Users can offer or rent dry van, refrigerated, flatbed or specialty trailers in less than five minutes, it says.

An ecosystem for service events

Decisiv has launched a new resource that that combines its service relationship management (SRM) platform that truck dealerships, service providers and fleets use with an ecosystem of partner solutions and services.

“The new Decisiv Marketplace will continue to build on the connectivity that is at the foundation of the success of our SRM Ecosystem,” said Dick Hyatt, president and CEO of Decisiv.

Solutions featured in the Decisiv Marketplace will be showcased to more than 40,000 active SRM platform users worldwide, including fleets with over 7 million assets in operation, and 4,500 dealers and service providers.

In a separate announcement, Decisive and TICO (Terminal Investment Corporation), which provides fleet services, terminal services, and terminal tractor manufacturing, introduced the TICO Edge system. The cloud-based platform allows TICO’s dealer network, customers and its TICO Uptime Center to communicate and collaborate and have real-time visibility into individual repair events.

Better food visibility

The largest asset-based, temperature-controlled LTL carrier in the United States, Frozen Food Express (FFE), recently selected FourKites to be its exclusive partner and supplier of visibility data.

FourKites combines real-time LTL shipment information from FFE’s electronic logging devices (ELDs) and trailer tracking, and also pulls in LTL service center information, along with truck-specific traffic and weather to give FFE a centralized dashboard to manage its customer service.

FFE is now able to give its customers predictive ETAs, and will be using FourKites’ Temperature Tracking system which automatically triggers an alert as soon as a load’s temperature falls outside a predefined range.

“We’re managing more than 400,000 active, temperature-controlled loads annually. To continue to be a trusted partner, we needed cutting-edge technology to help us better manage and measure our performance,” said Nick Cook, CIO and vice president of operations for Frozen Food Express.