FreightWaves Radio launched its sixth national show on Saturday, March 30 on SiriusXM’s Road Dog Channel 146. Unlike other industry-specific radio shows that often have particular messaging or lobbying aims, FreightWaves Radio is an independent, data-driven look at what’s really going on in the freight world, and the episode proved just that. Hosts Chad Prevost and John Kingston kicked things off from Chattanooga, Tennessee’s Freight Alley studio.
This week’s focus centered on all things freight and tech and innovation, including the announcement of Trucking Freight Futures and the FreightTech Innovation case competition challenge.
Quotable from Chad Eichelberger, COO and president of Reliance Partners:
“Looking at the industry as a whole right now, it’s an exciting time to be in the industry and be a part of it. If you look at the capital that’s going into this business and industry, the flow of VC money is into transportation technology, into tech-enabled freight brokerages, into the transportation insurance space. It’s incredible right now everything that’s happening, and I feel like there’s been a rapid change of pace from even four or five years ago.”
Quotable from Marty Parker, Lecturer at the University of Georgia School of Business and Supply Chain Program:
“We’re talking about how we can integrate SONAR into the classroom. The data sets will be real from companies like Home Depot, Central Garden and Pet, Georgia Pacific, and, of course, SONAR from FreightWaves. They’ll use standard techniques like making sequel queries. They’ll also use Tableau or Power BI from Microsoft to take this data and move it from data to information knowledge, and eventually wisdom to make great decisions with it.”
Quotable from Jeff Mason, Director of Partnerships at FreightWaves:
“The Company Lab – Co.Lab is a local nonprofit – what we call an accelerator – they provide expertise. Hopefully pointing them in the way of funding. So if you’re looking for a new, entrepreneurial-based business, a company like Co.Lab will help you. They’ve been a great partner for us to get the word out to the investment community as well.”
Quotable from Zach Strickland, the “Sultan of SONAR” at FreightWaves:
“Flatbed is very heavy with construction and manufacturing and a lot of raw material… the flatbed market coming up is probably not going to be as strong as it was last year. Housing starts were soft in the fourth quarter. We just don’t expect to see a lot of these raw goods being shipped around the country the way they have been.”
Quotable from Marc El Khoury, Chief Strategy Officer at U.S. Xpress:
“The biggest challenge I face [on a day-to-day basis] is data. Trying to make sense of the data, and trying to make sure our data is clean.”
Quotable from Marcus Shaw, CEO of Co.Lab:
“We had almost a couple hundred kids that applied for this [case competition]. We distilled it down to 50 of the top kids from some of the top schools across the country. We had an incredibly diverse group of kids that came into this, and they’re solving what I think is a pretty challenging case around transportation and logistics right now. The teams will compete and provide some solutions. They’re competing for real money, and also the chance to develop some relationships with people here in Chattanooga.”
The FreightWaves Radio show will keep on coming live to you each and every week from 3:00-5:00 p.m. EDT on SiriusXM’s Road Dog Channel 146. If you can’t tune in then, the show is also replayed on Saturday from 9:00-11:00 p.m. and then again on Sunday from 7:00-9:00 p.m. Also, the show is available for two weeks via SiriusXM’s on-demand feature. Join the discussion on all things freight and see how so much connects to transport and the movement of goods.