Introduction

With globalization, almost everything has become digital. In such a fast world, the Supply Chain Management, logistics, and freight procurement industries have to keep up with the speed of rapidly altering customers’ requirements. According to Machine Learning (ML) news, these industries spend hours each day on paperwork, which costs more than $170,000 a year. One way to make the situation better is to use Artificial Intelligence (AI) for some of the tasks. Transferring some manual tasks to the machine can resolve the problem with human-based paperwork and also improve productivity.

How can AI Help?

AI is stated to be the most hyped vertical in technology as of today. Set to generate close to $500 billion in revenue by the year 2024, the AI revolution will completely alter the business world as we know it today. Slow-moving categories have also started to successfully adopt AI. This is particularly true in freight procurement, logistics and supply chain management.

Following are a few ways that AI can help these industries:

• Predictive analysis

Timely delivery, efficient performance and reducing transportation costs are important for any logistics company. To accomplish this, it is crucial to perform an in-depth analysis based on historical data to recognize patterns for risks, take make forecasts and take corrective actions. Only by using a predictive analysis one can vastly adjust shipping patterns, improve the logistics processes, provide on-time delivery as well as forecast customers’ behavior.

• Getting data ops in order

Freight procurement and modern logistics businesses store a huge amount of data. Yet many either do not utilize it properly or depend on outdated methods to make sense of it. This is not good enough for companies who want to compete in today’s world. AI is proving to be a game changer – from making business intelligence decisions more agile to guaranteeing that data is clean and ready to be assessed, AI is fundamentally changing how carriers and shippers process, synthesize and act on their data.

• Transparency in procurement

In freight procurement and logistics, finding different carriers — which is required when a shippers’ primary carrier cannot fulfill a specific shipment is a major drawback for carriers and shippers. For years, finding an alternate carrier required dependency on middle men brokers market that provided very less transparency and with significant costs. Through the use of AI, carriers and shippers can now work directly with one another to facilitate alternate procurement.

• Robotics

Robotics means utilizing smart machines in the process of supply management. Typically, robots can perform everyday tasks including transportation, picking, delivery, warehousing, packing, and routing. The main difference between AI-enhanced robots and traditional industrial robots is that the last ones can perform more complex tasks without any human intervention. Moreover, smart robots can evolve by learning new types of tasks and performing complex actions. It means that this machinery in some cases can fully replace humans.

• Big Data

Like every other industry, logistics generates a huge amount of data. Collating data from various sources such as drivers’ apps, devices, systems and evaluating how various factors influence the process of delivery enables organizations to save budgets and avoid late deliveries and shipments. With big data analytics, insight into the data of past deliveries, reports from drivers and make improvements can be provided.

Conclusion

AI is revolutionizing the logistics processes by creating new ways of working with data, improvements in the supply chain, logistics and freights industry. Such technologies as predictive analysis, big data, and robotics can increase the efficiency in all industries.