Once regarded as stubbornly resistant to change, transportation and logistics is fast becoming a high-tech industry as entire supply chains reshape themselves around the demands of 21st century consumers. Innovators and disruptors are working to build brand-new solutions to age-old industry issues, and they just so happen to be building the supply chain of the future while they’re at it.
Mobility technology has exploded over the past several years, giving people the ability to hail a ride on demand. In most major cities, riders are able to choose everything from vehicle size to whether or not they want to share their ride with strangers. Some companies — including Via — have taken these solutions a step further, partnering with cities, transit agencies and organizations to provide things like on-demand public transportation, school bus routing, nonemergency medical transport and other paratransit options.
Via is well-versed at moving people from place to place in the most efficient and convenient way possible; they’ve been doing it for almost a decade, and now have more than 200 partners across five continents. More recently, however, the company has decided to leverage its expertise into Via Logistics, bringing a fresh approach to the last-mile delivery space.
“After more than 80 million rides and years of perfecting this technology, we realized our solutions can be very beneficial for delivery and logistics services. We built this technology to aggregate the more efficient delivery of human beings, and we are now applying that same vision to the logistics industry,” Via Head of Logistics Israel Duanis said. “We provide a real-time control center for efficient routing, as well as handling things like booking and scheduling. We do all of it in a customized way, creating a tailor-made look and feel that our partners know will resonate with their end consumers.”
And the market may be more ready than ever. According to McKinsey & Company, recent data shows the digital e-commerce industry has vaulted forward upward of five years in a matter of roughly eight weeks, dramatically shifting the way consumers shop and retailers do business.
At the end of the day, Via offers an end-to-end technological solution designed to allow companies to service more final customers with fewer vehicle miles traveled. The company is not unique in working to solve inefficiencies and addressing factors such as route planning, fleet management and dispatching services. Where Via stands out is their commitment to flexibility and customization, with the company white labeling the technology it actually uses as an operator. By translating mobility technology into transportation technology in the most straightforward way possible, the company is forging a new path for future innovation within the space.
The company’s unique solution allows for simplified same-day and next-day delivery planning, accommodates client-facing tracking and optimizes routes in real time for smaller, more accurate delivery windows. Consumers expect this level of convenience with rideshare apps and human transportation. Via is showing them that it is also possible with last-mile delivery, supporting anywhere from a few hundred deliveries daily in cities like Los Angeles and Washington to half a million packages per day with their largest partner in Tokyo.
“Companies have seen very significant improvements when it comes to efficiency. We are able to push more deliveries per hour per driver and reduce truck mileage, with our partners in Tokyo experiencing a 1.3x increase in driver efficiency after implementing the Via Logistics technology ” Duanis said. “A lot of data-driven technologies are used on our end to allow our operators and dispatchers to come up with the most efficient plans.”
Click here to learn more about how Via Logistics is changing the transportation industry.