How AI Is Shaping the Next Generation of TMS Development
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Transportation management systems are beginning to integrate artificial intelligence to unlock new levels of automation, improve decision-making and enable greater configurability.
“The algorithms know the last time you used the platform and how you used it, so it may make suggestions or create shortcuts that make the platform feel much more customized,” said Hans Galland, CEO of BeyondTrucks.
Tom McLeod, CEO of McLeod Software, said there are many potential applications for AI within a TMS. One significant use case is the ability to analyze current market rates and create a quote based on what is happening on a given freight lane. The quote could be sent automatically or routed to the broker to approve or override.
“This can dramatically increase efficiency for a freight brokerage operation and improve their margins,” McLeod said. “We’re looking to have this in production both from a native integration and with several integration partners in the beginning of 2025.”
Carmichael
Jesse Carmichael, product manager at Descartes Aljex, said the company’s next-generation product development is centered on pricing and automation to enable faster decision-making. “Rating and pricing is our next major leap in how we move forward,” he said.
AI can improve and streamline communication by extracting information from the TMS and passing it along to stakeholders.
“They may not know they’re interacting with AI. It is getting that good,” Carmichael said.
Integrating AI also can help remove manual steps for carriers and brokers.
Mitchell
Walter Mitchell, CEO of Tai Software, a TMS designed for the freight brokerage industry, said the company’s AI-powered document processor automatically handles documents within minutes to save brokers time.
“We also integrate AI into our email tools, which can scrape emails and auto-populate fields in the TMS, streamlining the quoting process,” Mitchell said.
In addition, Tai Software has an AI content generator to help brokers craft better emails, enhancing customer communication.
PortPro, a TMS provider for drayage companies, offers users an AI-enabled embedded email inbox that integrates email with the TMS. The feature was designed to bridge the gap between communication and operational workflow.
Careccio-Pisano
“It includes all the traditional email capabilities, plus more efficiency with PortPro’s AI that understands the context of the email and helps the user complete actions based on that, such as auto-generating quotes from a quote request or auto-creating loads from an email tender,” said Toni Ann Careccio-Pisano, PortPro’s chief customer officer.
Carriers and brokers are less likely to lose track of a crucial email or customer request, which could result in excessive demurrage and detention costs, lapses in service or disjointed team communication channels. It also makes it easier to track emails related to specific loads, quotes or customer requests.
Plus, AI models improve over time with increased usage, offering more advanced guidance and suggestions.
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“AI becomes more proactive, accessing your data and software to make intelligent recommendations,” Careccio-Pisano said.
Training AI on datasets will help companies identify anomalies.
“If the last five times you entered a bill of lading it had a certain format and this time it has an extra digit, it can ask if it is an error,” BeyondTrucks’ Galland said.
Eric Rempel, chief innovation officer for Redwood Logistics, expects to see the transportation industry adopt AI at a gradual pace initially, then ramp up quickly.
It will start with optimizing straightforward areas of workflow management, he said.
“You see if you like the benefits, and you keep a human in the middle as long as you want,” Rempel said. “When you’re comfortable with it, you release it on its own.”
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