Truckstop, flush with new investment from ICONIQ, has embraced its Silicon Valley marriage by teasing an “Iron Man”-inspired, Jarvis-like assistant for its load-matching product. The company told FreightWaves that the video is a suggestion of whats to come, not something that is in the market today.
Jarvis, the affable but omniscient assistant of Tony Stark in the “Iron Man” movies, has arrived in the trucking industry courtesy of Truckstop.com and its new Silicon Valley-fueled product development cycle.
The voice assistant integrated into Truckstop’s load-matching product uses Alexa voice-recognition technology, feeding commands into a deep learning system that allows the carrier to search for specific load parameters and selection criteria. This spares users the need to type into a computer or phone.
Truckstop posted a video showcasing the technology to its website Monday morning. You can watch it here.
Voice search, which is becoming more common for everyday activities, looks to be a good fit for load matching, especially as load boards migrate from Craigslist to NASDAQ-like marketplaces.
Truckstop recently rolled out a pilot test of it’s instant booking offering known as Buy It Now, which will allow the carrier to consummate the transaction completely inside the Truckstop marketplace. Schneider Logistics was the first 3PL to pilot the offering and a few others are also involved in the testing.
It seems Truckstop’s investment partner, ICONIQ, a family office funded by Zuckerberg, Sandburg and Dorsey money, is committed to modernizing and innovating Truckstop from the ground up. By rebuilding product infrastructure and releasing new features the industry desperately needs, Truckstop is challenging its own Innovator’s Dilemma.
In years past, it seemed that the load board space was content to allow for small but incremental pivots to product offerings, while enjoying enviable margins and growth. With load boards and all companies involved in the load-matching space under attack from upstarts, Truckstop appears poised to help define the future versus being defined by it.