COVID-19 ramps up desire for increased shipment visibility
The COVID-19 crisis has increased the desire for greater visibility into all of the fresh food supply chain.
That’s according to Jeff Newman, vice president of transportation, logistics and chain visibility for Irvine, Calif.-based CalAmp. He said the pinched supply chains during the crisis have created a greater sense of urgency for real-time shipment and supply chain visibility.
CalAmp offers route optimization technology to help drivers in a variety of scenarios, such as navigating closure of truck stops, and provides real-time updates on efficient routing through loading and unloading locations. The company also offers tracking technology for equipment and sensors to monitor temperature of cargo.
During the early weeks of the COVID-19 crisis, Newman said the company’s route optimization technology allowed drivers to adjust routes “on the fly.”
“Some of our customers did a really good job of mapping where the supplies needed to be, where the available trucks were to get there, and what were the most optimal routes, which were not necessarily pre-programmed routes,” he said.
Factors that influence route changes could be the closures of some rest stops, civil unrest, the availability of truck stops and other issues related to COVID-19 restrictions.
“So we went from a kind of a normal operating mode of these planned routes to a lot more dynamic in terms of conversations with the companies that own the goods, the shippers have the goods, and then the individual transportation companies into what was going on in real-time,” he said.
The company ships 2.5 million to 3 million devices per year, he said, and information gathered with the systems can be presented in a “dashboard” format.
“You can see analytics on the route analytics, on the driver’s performance and what’s happening with the planned route versus where they’re really located, the rules around that in terms what was supposed to happen and the action that can be taken,” he said.
CalAmp can monitor cargo inside truck trailers down to the pallet level. For produce, the company is starting its first large scale deployment with a shipper that delivers to restaurants and other customers.
“We are instrumenting their totes and crates with Bluetooth data loggers so effectively allows the temperature be monitored every 15 minutes,” he said.
That dovetails with the supplier needs for compliance to the Food Safety Modernization Act, he said.
“Those data loggers can synchronize with either the cab or the trailer or units installed in the warehouses and the (distribution center) when that cargo comes in contact with it,” the said.
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