With the big players in the e-commerce business setting ever new standards for supply chain operational functions across sectors, logistics enterprises are looking for ways to match up to the demands by leveraging innovative technologies. Helping them in their pursuit are a myriad of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies.
“Most of the logistic companies’ approach to digitisation was having a website for SaaS based service or as a discovery platform and having a proprietary mobile app for their customers. Today we are seeing a third element, the messaging app. This chat bot is the manifestation of AI technology in the logistic industry,” said Srinivas B Vijayaraghavan, Vice President – Marketing, Gupshup.
He was presenting and moderating a live webinar on ‘Deployment of Artificial intelligence in logistics, Accelerating customer experience’; presented by Gupshup, powered by Manufacturing Today India and attended by panellists who are technology experts and solution providers for the logistics industry.
The members on the panel included Soham Chokshi, Co-Founder & CEO, Shipsy.io; Venu Kondur, CEO & Co-founder, LOBB; Krishna Guha, Co-founder, Caliper Business Solution, Innovator of transportEG, Founder of BAP Global; and Parag Aggarwal, Co-Founder & CEO, GoBOLT.
Introducing the panellists and laying out the event, Syed Ameen, Editor, Manufacturing Today India, welcomed the attendees and handed over the session to Vijayaraghavan to carry on the proceedings.
Through the 90 minutes of intense deliberations, the panellists ran through a whole gamut of topics relating to the use of AI (Artificial Intelligence) in logistics and supply chain management.
AI: Adopting Conversational Intelligence
Among the foremost AI technologies gaining rapid acceptance in replacing inefficiency-breeding person-to-person interaction is the Conversational Artificial Intelligence (AI). It entails connecting businesses to their customers through the medium of conversational messaging using cobot or virtual agent.
“We believe the Conversation AI can make the whole supply chain experience seamless,” said Vijayaraghavan of Gupshup; a leading conversational messaging platform powering over six billion messages per month.
Taking an overview of the sector, Vijayaraghavan, in his key-note address, straight away swooped down to the challenges in the logistics industry. Among them, he counted lack of diversity in procurement sources and lack of digital suave among the workforce.
Third and importantly, customer support is a major challenge and he dwelt on it in detail. Even with all the tech support available, customers have to face hassle in terms of tracking of shipment and access to customer support.
A big chunk of these challenges can be addressed with conversation.
“Logistics, just as any other value-chain, is an interplay or interlink of many entities that form a strong chain. And, wherever you have two entities, you have potential for conversation to sort a lot of gaps,” contextualised Vijayaraghavan, whose carrier-grade platform provides a single messaging API for 30+ channels.
Citing examples from the solutions provided by his own company, he sketched the industry scenario where businesses are building conversational stacks to connect the supply side to the last mile or the middle mile with cross-channel integration, contextual conversation and query handling.
Cross-channel Integration uses WhatsApp to establish a two-way communication between customers and shipping companies and uses SMS for real-time updates on the arriving shipment.
Contextual Conversation through creation of Micro Journey provides for “modular conversation workflows replicating digital UI (User Interface) workflows and help customers envisage all the steps of the supply chain from their origin to their destination.”
Query Handling is addressed with AI and NLP (Natural Learning Process) algorithms to engage with customer query contextually and finally with a human agent to take-over when all else fails. “The queries are handled at every hand-off at every transition point.”
With person-to-person interaction out of the way, bots simplify procurement, distribution and tracking; reduces customer wait-times; expedites placement of orders and resolution of payment related queries, enumerated Vijayaraghavan.
“Logistics is a sector that is ripe and ready for digitisation; especially with the amount of data that is being generated across the network. We believe Conversational AI can really make this whole supply-chain experience very seamless,” said the Vice President – Marketing, Gupshup, who claims to have enabled businesses to make conversation an integral part of their customer engagement success.
Enhancing visibility, reducing time
The presentation on AI’s role in logistics got readily substantiated by the CEO and Co-founder of LOBB, Venu Kondur whose company leverages technology as its differentiator in the market.
“Technology is the core and the backbone of our business and that’s how we differentiate ourselves,” he declared.
The use and prospects of technologies in the logistic sector was very vividly illustrated by Kondur by spelling out some of the examples from his own company.
Unlike the conventional houses in the business, Kondur explained, LOBB uses technology to scan for the right trucker, for the right driver, the right factors to be used for the right material, find exactly the right truck for the right demand and all this at the right price. It uses technology to work out the right price on a daily basis in each of the markets. The accuracy gives it an edge in keeping itself relevant in a market that sees 20-25% volatility.
Use of technology begins right from the on-boarding of a truck. The Machine Model is fed the photos of vehicles sent by ‘foot-on-the-field’ and the Machine Intelligence provides all the necessary details of the truck and its owner. A centralised call centre backs it up helping the owner with the on-boarding. Thereon, it is the technology models combing through a huge number of varying factors that help demand meet supply.
“We are a digital freight market place which we wouldn’t be if we were not able to help demand meet supply and vice-versa.” There are a huge number of variables that have to be factored in to help demand and supply meet for which Kondur makes use of technology. “We have captured over 15 million footprints that tells us about the whole Variable Market Dynamics (VMD).”
Whether a good is perishable or an industrial products, or an FMCG; whether it is a 24-hour-deadline pharma product, or an overnight-scheduled delivery of Amazon or Flipkart, or a 48-72 hours timeline of an OEM product for an automobile company; whether you need a double driver or a single driver in a truck; there is a whole lot of things to be factored or what Kondur calls Variable Market Dynamics (VMD).
“The VMD, as part of our tech stack, understands the whole transit intelligence and understands that the right trucker has to be contextually nudged at the right time so that he responds at that particular price.”
LOBB also collects location intelligence that helps it pick up the right truck and plan return load journeys.
“We use technology in our truck discovery process which is a KPI for us on a daily basis. Conversational Intelligence helps in building the technology that sorts out all the queries.”
Creating technology ecosystem
Leveraging AI to meet rising customer expectations at all levels in the competitive logistics industry ran through the entire session at the round table.
For instance, customers like Amazon or Flipkart are setting up demanding service levels like delivery time of 50 kms per hour converting to a Delhi-Bangalore delivery time of 48 hours or a Delhi-Mumbai of 28 hours, pointed Parag Aggarwal, Co-Founder & CEO, GoBolt.
“How do you deploy technology both in terms of hardware and software to achieve these service levels at the right optimum cost,” is the challenge before the logistics players.
He meets the challenge by taking technology beyond the conventional asset tracking device. “It is not about visibility alone. It is about how visibility is getting imparted into the entire eco-system.”
Keeping an eye on the twin parameters of supply chain efficiency; the cost and the responsiveness, GoBOLT serves all the e-commerce companies, leveraging technologies for mapping the right load and the right truck, IoT device to monitor driver behaviour for speed and safety concerns and very importantly for enhancing the number of kilometres that it is able to sweat its asset.
“An average trucker would be running around 7,000-8,000 kms. At GoBOLT, using hybrid models having both the ownership and the dedicated marketplace trucks, we are able to sweat our asset approximately 15,000 kms per month. We can achieve this only because of the robust technology that we have adopted,” emphasised Aggarwal whose company has positioned itself as the express logistic player for the middle mile. “AI in the supply chain has the biggest potential to leverage itself with focus on both responsiveness and efficiency,” he declared.
Leveraging data
“People want to move away from human-based decision making,” notes Soham Chokshi, Co-Founder & CEO, Shipsy.io endorsing the earlier speakers on the role of technology in logistics.
He was speaking in the context of shippers, especially the large ones, who don’t want to go with the aggregators and want to deal with the vendors themselves. At the same time, they are at a loss at selecting from among a multiple vendors that they have empanelled; scanning the historic performance of a vendor; the status of digitised contracts; digitised SLAs; performance vs SLAs; the mode of transport- air, water or rail – to select; if by ocean then whether to go with LCL or FCL; and a host of other intelligence inputs to arrive at a decision.
These are the places where there is a need for intelligence in logistics, according to the Co-Founder CEO of Shipsy.io, among the leading SaaS based solution providers for reducing logistic cost and enabling on-time delivery working on a ‘Bloomberg for supply-chain’ model.
The long haul
Among the early users of data and pioneer of digital supply-chain concept is Krishna Guha, Co-founder, Caliper Business Solution, Innovator of transportEG, Founder of BAP Global. According to him, the industry is currently consignor-consignee driven and 20-30% wastage of time occurs at these very points. He dwelt on the need to leverage data bottom-up and not top-down and insisted on all the stake-holders being connected one-to-one.
“We need one application to connect with consumers. Each app should be linked to consumers or businesses on a one-to-one basis,” said Guha.
From Uber-Ola model of tech adaptation to gain customer satisfaction, to ‘bay-time’ management for taking early correction in case of disruption, to use of algorithms and historic data for developing flexibility in the tech system, to developing accuracy in the tech-suggested solutions; and to messaging apps and chatbots; the panellists probed into the entire gamut of technology aspects in the industry.
“Each and every node in the sector is interconnected. None can behave in a solitary manner. Any disruption in any node is bound to have an impact on the entire supply chain. Technology ensures visibility of the disruption across to all the stakeholders and predicts action with the help of well-defined algorithms and historic data,” said the GoBOLT CEO.
The thought-proving session concluded with the editor Syed Ameen Kader holding a Q&A session while Business Head, Hafeez Shaikh, thanked the attendees.
