AscendTMS has teamed up with Trucker Tools to integrate Smart Capacity into its system, giving brokers and shippers the ability to see available truck capacity several days before the trucks are empty.
Ascend, an InMotion Global product, has almost 21,000 customers, making it the most popular transportation management system (TMS) software in the space today. The company caters primarily to smaller players in the industry, working to level the playing field between small and large businesses.
Utilizing Trucker Tools’ Smart Capacity allows brokers to uncover “hidden capacity” they would not be able to contact otherwise, according to InMotion Global President and CEO Tim Higham. This obviously aids brokers by highlighting available capacity, but it also helps carriers stay loaded.
Over 125,000 small carriers are active users of the mobile app and the Smart Capacity portal, according to Trucker Tools Founder and CEO Prasad Gollapalli.
“The ability to quickly and accurately access the capacity of these small-fleet independent truckers, combined with the robust features of Trucker Tools for capacity planning, load-matching and automated tracking, significantly increases the value, functional utility and performance of this leading TMS platform – at no extra cost to users,” Gollapalli said.
Partnering with Ascend helps Trucker Tools get closer to existing and potential customers.
“Our approach is to take the technology where the customer is, not make the customer come to us,” Gollapalli said.
Higham said the company has evaluated several different capacity matching systems, but the decision to partner with Trucker Tools was a clear one.
“Trucker Tools has the advantage of having its app in the hands of about 125,000 fleets out there, giving the company the advantage of knowing where a truck has been, where it is and where it is going. The latter is probably most important to us,” Higham said. “If someone is on their way to Chicago, and they’re going to be empty tomorrow morning, that is really important information to know, both for the carrier looking for a load and the broker looking to find capacity.”
Both companies share a common goal – giving small companies the leverage they need to play in the big leagues.
“There are some great transportation management systems out there, but the cost is very high,” Higham explained. “Our system is nothing up front, and it is $59 per month. It puts this really powerful technology into the hands of so many brokers and carriers who are now able to use technology that ordinarily they would never have access too.”
The kind of technology available to companies via Ascend and Trucker Tools would have been reserved for the largest, wealthiest companies just a decade ago. With 80 to 90 percent of the industry falling into the “smaller company” category, access to comparable technology is a gamechanger, according to Higham.
“The privilege is moving away from the big broker or the big shipper or the big carrier, and it is truly being trickled down,” Higham said. “It is democratizing technology.”