Digtal Container Shipping
- 02/08/2021
Digital Container Shipping
In the 21st century digital container shipping , it is time for technology to lead a new revolution. In ocean freight supply chains, meaningful innovation is long overdue. The container shipping industry in the past decade and more has been characterized by intense peaks and troughs, rivalries and rate wars – but little in the way of real technological innovation.
While container ships, ports and inland logistics alike have gotten much larger, they have not become much smarter, nor more connected to the wider logistics ecosystem. A wave of change is coming to container supply chains both on land and, increasingly, at sea, driven on the one hand by rapid advances in the cloud, digitization, automation and autonomous traffic, and on the other by evolving market dynamics.
In contrast to just a couple of years back, technology-enabled change is increasingly on the senior management agenda as an “when, not if” response to help manage massive complexity and scale, strip out waste and cost, and repurpose the ponderous might of maritime container trade for the on-demand era of Amazon and Alibaba
All of this history brings us to the present, and continued transformation in global supply chains. One of the biggest influences has been the explosion of manufacturing in Asia, with China, Japan and Korea becoming major suppliers and exporters of goods
AI and machine learning combines with predictive and prescriptive analytics to provide better forecasting, enhanced order management and more. Supply chain managers need effective risk management to deal with the unexpected, whether that’s customs and tariffs, natural disasters or issues with global transport.
Whatever the future holds, one thing is certain, if we apply the same innovation to global supply chains as we have in the past, then we’ll continue to see greater efficiencies, optimization and profit margins.
