Descartes Systems Group EVP Chris Jones in an exclusive interview with Freightcomms to capture his thoughts on technology updates in the logistics and supply chain industry.
Q: After the Covid-19 situation how do you see the logistics and supply chain industry is adapting to the new normal?
The logistics industry operations and supply chains have done an amazing job adopting to the tremendous challenges that were placed on them virtually overnight. There has been a significant amount of creativity as organizations continue to address the evolution of pandemic. We are not at a steady state, so I would say, in this new normal, goods are moving as well as can be expected, but not as efficiently as in the past.
Q: How is Technology helping customers to deal with the crises?
There are many ways technology has helped, but three of the most important are
1) allow distributed organizations to continue to operate through the automation of logistics and supply chain processes,
2) increasing agility to address significant swings in demand and
3) supporting social distancing to keep logistics and supply chain professionals safe.
Q: How do you think customers have benefited with Descartes Systems in the current Covid-19 situation?
In the three areas I just mentioned. We helped logistics services providers (LSPs) to quickly and effectively move their operations to work from home, dynamically plan deliveries and services to meet changing customer demand and implement contactless proof-of-delivery to safely capture critical customer delivery information.
Q: After the acquisition of Kontainers, a freight digital platform, how do you think it will add value to the digital freight market?
Digitization is an imperative for LSPs and Kontainers fills in an important part of that journey by providing self-service booking and tracking for an LSP’s customers. As an analogy, you can look at how the airline industry transformed itself when it offered its customers the ability to book their flights.
Q: Could you please tell us a little more about Descartes collaboration with Microsoft and how it is helping customers in this supply chain disruption?
We use Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform for a number of our solutions. It allowed us to offer our solutions in a more agile way to address our customers rapidly changing needs as a result of the coronavirus.
Q: How does Descartes software work? It is simple across all the industries?
We were an early adopter of cloud-based solutions. We serve a diverse set of industries and offer a broad range of solutions that span global and local operations and very large and very small organizations, so this answer varies. Most of our solutions are designed to simplify and streamline logistics and supply chain operations. However, we have a class of solutions that are designed for very sophisticated transportation problems and, by their nature, more complex but provide our customers with competitive differentiation they seek.
Q: Could you please tell us more about Global Descartes Air Messaging Gateway? How will it be adding value to your customers?
The Descartes Global Logistics Network is used by the majority of air cargo carriers and forwarders. The Air messaging gateway provides air cargo carriers with a single point to connect to all of their forwarding customers. We simplify the connectivity and communication process for the carriers and their customers.
Q: What are some of the most important things leaders in the tech industry are discussing this year?
In the logistics industry and supply chains, agility and automation are the top topics.
This year has proven that most logistics and supply chain strategies were not as flexible and reactive as once thought. Pivoting to address the constantly changing market demands has been tough for many organizations, especially from a cost perspective. However, for those who have the right processes and supporting technology, the current situation has proven a tremendous opportunity to grow their business as others were slow to react.
The coronavirus has accelerated the digitization agenda for most organizations. Work from home and social distancing has killed paper-based processes and shown the need for more automation of processes. Those organizations that had already started the digitization process were much more prepared to successfully transitioned to a distributed work environment and not miss a beat doing it. In addition, it exposed the need for the customer interaction to move from the phone to online and provide them with more compelling services they could access without help.