In the third quarter of 2021 alone, venture capitalists in the U.S. and Europe pumped $7.8 billion into the freight technology industry — an increase of over 100% year-over-year. In a prolonged pandemic and season of tight capacity, supply chain fragility is a mainstream concern, as is how to connect the fragmented market of trucking capacity with available loads.
After all, around 80% of the freight in the U.S. is hauled by carriers with fewer than 100 trucks, and as fleet size decreases from 100, the likelihood that those fleets aren’t integrated into a TMS or visibility platform increases. Many of them are even cautious about integrating with a brokerage.
These were among the considerations of J.J. Singh, longtime transportation executive, as he was developing the EKA platform in 2017: “How could we connect these disparate parties to move freight and enable brokers, carriers and shippers on a cost structure that’s competitive with larger entities. The small carriers want to remain independent — they’re the wellspring of entrepreneurs and the people who bring capacity. So that’s why we wanted to deliver an affordable and democratized source of technology.”
Within the past year, EKA introduced its broker-specific TMS to market. In conversation with one of its first customers, Yeti Logistics, co-founder James Dockery-Jackson praised EKA’s simple and intuitive workflows, its quick onboarding, as well as its capacity to seamlessly integrate with third-party services like payments, telematics, invoicing or accounting. In November, EKA announced the formation of its own financial services subsidiary, EKA Logistics Capital.
“If we want to go get fancy and crazy and buy expensive toys, we can hook them in, but at the end of the day, we can build, book and dispatch a load very, very quickly,” said Dockery-Jackson. “EKA allows you to do the basic things you need to do, but it can also grow with you as you grow. I’ve used other TMS systems that were remarkably powerful and built on top of the line data architecture system, but there was so much power that most users couldn’t get through the basic transaction in a timely manner. That’s one of the things we looked at with EKA was that speed to execution, just being able to do the simple stuff really well.”
While Yeti itself doesn’t own assets, its agents own a total of 64 trucks and specialize mostly in reefer freight and oil and gas. Without knowing the trajectory of freight technology — in one year, let alone five — Dockery-Jackson said EKA’s API- and cloud-based platform serves as a nucleus of the operation, with the capacity to hook into other emerging technologies. Broker customers can be demanding customers, he said, always expecting the latest technologies, whether machine learning or AI.
“We don’t emphasize technology for the sake of technology, but brokers, carriers and shippers need technology,” said Jim Best, chief growth officer at EKA. “Otherwise they’re going to be a cameo player in other companies’ supply chains. You’ve got to have your own technology to get your own data and control your destiny with that. And be able to report on your own performance, rather than respond to somebody else’s.”
In fact, EKA’s highest benefits are enjoyed by customers who act as both carriers and brokers and can switch between the carrier and broker TMS. Unlike competitors, whose broker system development may come as an afterthought to their primary carrier TMS, or vice versa, the EKA system has been developed with equal attention to meeting the end-to-end TMS needs of each of the three supply chain partners — carriers, brokers and shippers — and the integration between them to trade and operate effectively.
EJ Poultry started off in 1978 as a chicken item line drop distributor but launched its 3PL 16 years ago to help provide transportation consistency for its retail customers. Recently, it launched its power-only program. After trying Ascend TMS, VP of Sales Scott Robbert said EJ Poultry was hungry for more one-on-one attention from the software company, especially since the company functions as a shipper, carrier and broker. In 2019, it began its partnership with EKA.
“We started off with just one truck and we’ve been able to scale with EKA working right alongside us, instead of working with a larger incumbent and getting charged 50 bucks per question,” said Robbert. “We are constantly pushing for tweaks or improvements, especially being a reefer company that is hauling a lot of food for the masses and for large companies like JBS, Sanderson and Rainier Fruit. It’s great to have a system that can add some nuances with notes, temperatures and customer requirements.”
EKA is helping EJ Poultry integrate its ELD into the TMS, as well as its partnerships with, Transflo, Orbcomm for reefer control, and Microsoft Teams. Because it’s cloud-based, EJ Poultry’s team was able to easily transition to remote work during the outset of COVID-19 and maintain the rigor of its food delivery duties as an essential business. Robbert said that in 2022, he hopes to leverage EKA’s freight finding tool and share load boards with other brokerages like Yeti Logistics. EKA’s platform, Robbert said, allows competitors to tear down walls in order to work together.
“Most of the time, brokers might ask a smaller carrier to use the same TMS as they do — ‘but it’s going to cost you $2,200 a month.’ The carriers will refuse,” said Robbert. “The carriers that have three trucks, instead of using Excel spreadsheets, are getting integrated with EKA. Because of its affordability, the smaller carriers can spend that money somewhere else and add their trucks and trailers to the network. It’s not really a you versus me scenario.”