2000 exhibitors from 60 countries and one common topic present in all the stands and lectures – Logistics 4.0. Last Friday Munich trade fair Transport Logistics 2017 ended – the biggest event of this type in Europe.
Trade fairs have proven that the digitisation in the TSL industry is a word that stops being repeated in universities and during conferences. Many exhibitors showed up in Munich with prototypes of their first solutions based on data collection and system integration.
Logistics is definitely on the brink of the greatest revolution of recent decades. The revolution which will form processes from the scratch, define the requirements for market participants and eliminate those who will not be able to adapt. On the other hand, in comparison to other economy sectors, transport is poorly prepared for this change.
“Data is the new gold for logistics”
These words of Frauke Heistermann, responsible for digitisation in Siemens Postal, Parcel & Airport Logistics GmbH, best show the value of gathering data about developments in business processes. However, like with gold, each resource is gaining in value when we are able to exchange it. That is why in addition to gathering information companies have to integrate with each other, quickly and automatically transmit information about demand for transport, tasks, locations and fleet occupancy, etc. Ryan Petersen, Flexport CEO summed it up – “Every company needs to become a software company”.
What makes the Economy 4.0 the upcoming revolution?
- the level of manufacture automation thanks to crossing the company/company barrier may actually significantly increase the efficiency of production processes. In practice the whole process in the complete Economy 4.0 will be completely automatic while taking into account also contractors and subcontractors. People will be needed only to carry intermediate products;
- the products will be gathering data in an increasingly stronger way and transmit it to the Big Data warehouses. There data will be used to optimise manufacture and sales products and processes;
- automatic systems will offer and sell services tailored to our needs (for example, the system will know when we run out of coffee at home);
- the revolution will not miss transport. The “couch forwarding” will be a thing of the past. Carriers will be working directly with customers (better rates) on common computer systems. The transport company will make data about current and future location of the vehicle or the transport status etc. available to the customer. Thanks to this, the system will automatically adjust and propose the best carrier for your order. Today’s “call and ask whether they can use their truck” will quickly become just a memory.
Don’t be left behind
No matter how improbable and remote it seems to us, the future in which the logistics processes are automatic and the decisions are made by algorithms based on the data collected, the revolution has already begun. Experts warn against marginalisation which threatens companies or even whole countries who will be not be to keep up with Logistics 4.0. Even though it has been clearly visible that Western companies, mainly German ones, are intensely working on digitalisation.
