FreightTech Friday: Motive’s new tech, goFlux’s $6M raise

Motive, a leading provider of industrial technologies, orchestrated its inaugural user conference, Vision 24, in Nashville, Tennessee, this week. This event served as a platform, uniting key stakeholders across sectors such as transportation, farming, mining, construction and manufacturing.

The conference allowed thought leaders to engage in dynamic discussions, sharing insights and best practices pertinent to Motive’s expanding product portfolio, as it introduced its AI Omnicam, Motive Beacon and Driver Safety Solution.

AI Omnivision is a computer vision platform that can be used across the physical economy sectors to deploy custom AI models. For waste services, it can help detect overflowing bins or hazardous materials. For construction, it monitors job sites in real time to prevent accidents, and for transportation, it can help identify unauthorized cargo movements and plan for other security and compliance issues.

Bluetooth-based Motive Beacon, consisting of its Gateway and Mesh Network offerings, helps manage and track assets of all sizes.

While indoors, the Gateway forms a wireless network, helpful for warehousing and construction sites, enabling workers to locate tools and equipment quickly through the Motive Fleet app. Outdoors, the Mesh Network utilizes over 2 million active Gateways and app users to track assets in transit outside facility boundaries.

Motive’s Driver Safety Solution helps detect and report on collisions. Its AI models detect unsafe driving behavior like drowsiness, lane swerving and forward collisions. Upon collision, its First Responder feature automatically dispatches vehicle data to emergency services while notifying safety managers, especially helpful for assets in remote areas.

FreightWaves’ enterprise fleet expert Thomas Wasson attended the 500-customer event and particularly enjoyed the focus on safety across the physical economy.

“It was all about safety, but not just in trucking,” said Wasson. “Construction was a big topic, especially using computer vision to identify everyday problems like workers not using hard hats.”

He also liked the new approach of using updated technology to be proactive and not reactive to compliance problems with trucking, something that could bring savings to fleets.

“Ten years ago, fleet managers just reacted to driver complaints from shippers, motorists and other witnesses. Now managers can get real-time information and help coach and develop drivers out of those bad habits. … With this reporting on hand, fleets should be able to renegotiate lower insurance rates because they can prove driver behavior at any given time,” he explained.

GoFlux raises $6M for Latin American freight management platform

Sao Paulo-based FreightTech provider goFlux announced Wednesday it has closed a $6 million Series A round led by Capria Ventures with participation from past investor SP Ventures and new investors The Yield Lab Latam, Blue Impact Global, Reflect Ventures and Arrebol Capital. The company has raised about $7.2 million since its first round of funding in 2021.

GoFlux’s board of directors Pedro Azevedo, Luis Fernando Martinez, Rodrigo Gonçalves and Renato Castilho. (Photo: GoFlux)

The new capital will be used to continue building its goFlux View platform, which leverages generative AI to view future freight market behavior and help customers make better decisions faster. GoFlux also has its naConta fintech platform, its Club solution and its CarbonFree product to help carriers manage their cash flow, back-office operations and carbon footprints.

According to the company, last year its freight management platform supported over 1.5 billion tons of cargo moved throughout Brazil, eliminating bottlenecks.

“The Brazilian freight market faces several bottlenecks that hinder its efficiency and generate extra costs,” Rodrigo Gonçalves, founder and CEO of goFlux, told FreightWaves.

As with the U.S. freight market, the industry is plagued by market fragmentation, leading to a lack of transparency in price and service. It also lacks digitalization, which leads to plenty of management inefficiencies all along the supply chain.

“The lack of integration between systems and processes makes it difficult to track cargo and manage the truck fleet. Without knowing where the cargo is and how the fleet is operating, it is impossible to optimize routes and reduce costs,” Gonçalves said of the carrier experience.

However, in Latin America, the freight market conditions are much different at present.

“Latam freight demand is resilient, supported by strong demand in agribusiness in countries like Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay. We also expect better GDP growth in the next few years to boost the demand for the freight industry,” he said. “Latam depends on truck freight; more than 65% of the total volume is moved with trucks, so we are bullish about Latam freight growth.”

With this round of funding, the company looks to operate in Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, Mexico and the United States.

“The U.S. freight market is transforming,” said Gonçalves. “We see a rising demand for truck freight for grains and agribusiness due to the increasing competition for rail capacity and the bottlenecks at the Mississippi River. So where there’s a crisis, we see opportunity, and we never bet against America.”

Brief Bytes

Navix announced Tuesday it has entered a partnership with Chicago-based Avenue Logistics to streamline the company’s freight auditing and invoicing processes. Patrick O’Connor, CFO at Avenue Logistics, expresses confidence in the partnership’s ability to catalyze growth and enhance relationships with customers and carriers.

Predictive maintenance solution Intangles introduced a new product, InRoute Connect, on Thursday. Alan McMillan, president of Intangles Americas, emphasized the urgency of avoiding breakdowns and delays and said the company’s AI-powered platform, installed in over 175,000 vehicles globally, offers predictive insights, reducing repair costs and downtime. InRoute Connect features a comprehensive database of service centers and provides fleets control over maintenance processes.

Freight execution platform Banyan Technology announced partners with visibility provider GoComet to enhance ocean and air tracking and freight spend management. This collaboration offers real-time visibility, live updates and advanced automation, elevating shipping operations’ efficiency. Banyan has expanded its mission beyond less-than-truckload shipping solutions, focusing on comprehensive shipping innovations.