Cold-chain tracking updates, AI freight automation & more

00:00 In this week’s CCJ Tech Shorts, a transportation technology provider offers carriers a try-before-you-buy tool, a fleet payments platform vets vendors on behalf of over-the-road customers and more.

00:23 EBE Technologies, a provider of back-office automation for the transportation industry, is giving carriers the ability to test drive its software. At ebeships.com, carriers can access tools that let them experiment with EBE’s solutions using their own operations.

EBE Technologies’ president and CEO (Larry Kerr) said, “Carriers want to see software work on their own documents before they believe it. The new site lets them do that on their first visit."

Visitors can calculate the annual cost of manual back-office work, score their safety program with EBE’s Fleet Defensibility Scorecard, and upload their most difficult freight documents into EBE’s back-office workflow automation suite BeyondAI and receive the extraction.

01:07 Tracking solutions provider Surfact has partnered with PHY Wireless to improve tracking frequency and extend battery life across cold-chain and food transportation operations.

PHY Wireless' edge-based cellular positioning technology leverages existing cellular network signals to calculate location directly on the device, delivering accurate positioning with significantly lower power consumption.

Surfact develops ruggedized tracking devices that monitor the location, condition and integrity of temperature-sensitive goods throughout the supply chain. PHY’s cellular signals are specifically engineered to provide reliable coverage deep inside buildings, shipping containers and other hard-to-reach locations associated with logistics environments.

The collaboration will also support Surfact's efforts to expand its platform into North America.

01:56 Payment processing platform WEX is offering a new resource that helps over-the-road (OTR) customers discover and connect with vetted third-party providers offering products and services to help them operate and grow their businesses.

WEX’s new Verified Vendors program gives customers a centralized place to learn about relevant solutions before connecting with a provider.

Verified Vendors connects customers with providers across several categories, including BestPass for toll transponders, Engine for hotel and travel reservations, MapUp for toll reconciliation, TFS Financial for equipment financing, TruckerPath for navigation and SCI for terminal hardware and software. The vendor lineup is expected to grow.

WEX customers can access Verified Vendors at no cost and submit requests to connect with participating providers directly through the WEX platform.

02:44 BravoTran, a financial automation platform built for freight forwarders and customs brokers that integrates with third-party logistics and TMS platforms, has launched BravoTran Cash Application.

BravoTran Cash Application connects incoming payments with customer remittance advice, original invoices and bank deposit information within supply chain software platform CargoWise. The solution then closes confirmed matches directly in CargoWise, routing only exceptions that need human review to a centralized workflow.

This reduces manual labor by eliminating the need to search multiple systems for information, enabling forwarders to process more payments without adding proportional staff.

03:25 Verifone, a provider of payments and commerce technologies, has introduced a new solution that addresses a common challenge among retailers: running separate hardware and point-of-sale systems for different fleet networks.

Commander Fleet enables existing Verifone customers to accept WEX and other mainstream commercial fleet fuel cards through a single point-of-sale system that supports heavy fleet, light fleet and consumer transactions, while meeting all required fleet-specific data capture needs.

These are some of the benefits retailers gain by unifying fleet card processing:

• Lowers total cost of ownership by eliminating duplicate hardware, licenses and service contracts with the flexibility to expand as fleet networks evolve
• Enables faster transactions and therefore greater truck throughput by reducing checkout friction
• Enhances productivity by simplifying employee training and reducing errors
• Unifies reporting and provides actionable insights