Our views on route optimization

The most important thing for a route optimizing tool is delivering a good and realistic plan. In the past, we have already discussed how bad data quality can be recognized. In this blog, we will talk about how to avoid bad routing plans.

Do businesses respect the interests of all stakeholders, do they use an environmentally sustainable approach, and are they still profitable? People, planet and profit: these are the three values of John Elkington's triple bottom line. It's a key concept in Corporate Social Responsibility that all companies must embrace if they want to generate sustainable value. It's worth emphasizing the contribution of high quality route planning software to this philosophy. Here's how.

A lot of businesses and organizations perceive planning as a tedious and time-consuming process. A Route optimization tool can help planners. But even with these kind of tools, creating a planning can still be a struggle. Here are four ways to speed up your planning process.

In today's data-driven world, data is for many businesses as essential as the blood in our veins. Companies store a lot of data in all types of systems. Storing data is important, but storing low quality data makes it a useless effort. When we look at optimization packages, data is THE most important factor. Using data with low quality, equals non-usable outcomes of the optimization. Garbage in is garbage out. So, detecting that garbage and turning it into a valuable asset is an necessary first step. Data cleaning is a process that might require too much time but as experience grows, you get to know the quick sanity-checks that will often save a lot of time. Below we list some validations, ranging from 1-minute scans to deep analysis simulations.

In our series of blogs about e-commerce, we have already discussed the impact and benefits of competitor cooperation. Today, resource sharing among competitors is a well-known phenomenon in many industries. For the highly competitive transport sector, optimized cooperation would be a market disruption that brings immense efficiency gains. We want to help the industry in reaching that potential.

In 2019 the toll rates for trucks on the German roads increased significantly. For transport companies, this cost item is no longer negligible and it may be worthwhile to think carefully about the way in which you send transport through Germany.

The fact that the toll rates for trucks in Germany rose considerably on the 1st of January 2019 is primarily due to a budgetary reason. The German government is struggling with financial shortages for the construction and maintenance of roads and hopes to drive the gap with higher toll rates. In return foreign transport companies get a better infrastructure, but that is not the only explanation. The German government also charges costs for noise pollution and environmental impact in the new rates.

In the past, we have already seen that planning manually is not sufficient in transport-based industries. A tool in support can help planners and reduce costs significantly by combining the planners’ expertise with route optimization algorithms. In our experience, the transport industry is not the only industry that can benefit from route optimization software. On top of that, we see that companies can rise their revenues, just by using the right tools. 

Companies like Tesla, Otto and Waymo have been working on autonomous trucks for years. In 2015, the first semi-autonomous truck was placed on the road by Mercedes-Benz. Self-driving trucks are expected to become the norm in the near future, but plenty of steps remain to be taken. The use of self-driving trucks could lead to an estimated $300 billion saving within the industry.

Blockchain is one of today’s hottest technological hypes. While the transport sector may well derive value from this technology, we nonetheless better think twice before we go jumping on the bandwagon. To gain a better insight into the technology’s potential, we outline below the most important success factors and the pitfalls.

Given the cost for transport companies attached to the closure of motorway parking areas, you might just as well keep the parking areas open and invest in extra security. Let's have a look at the consequences of the detour that drivers make.