Deltion Blog

Not another logistics blog!

Denis O’Sullivan, CEO Deltion — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 12:00:00 +0000

We are pleased to announce the birth of a new Supply Chain and Logistics Blog – Views from the Logistics Control Tower, inspired by response to the very successful CarrierNet Logistics Control Tower.

This will be an ad-hoc series of postings and we hope you will also help to make it a success. We also hope to make if truly interactive so that you will not be saying “Not another Logistics Blog”.

At Deltion we are all about creating functionality and features to help manage efficient supply chains and logistics – enabled by applying the latest web tools. We are already delivering the future – even as it changes.

Again, welcome on board. We will work hard to make it worth your while to make return visits.

Logistics Live and friendly in the Cloud

Denis O’Sullivan, CEO Deltion — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 12:16:00 +0000

With a new live dashboard and interactive maps, Deltion’s Cloud Computing CarrierNet Version 6 has taken a leap forward in user friendliness, while also helping logistics operations to reduce their costs and improve their sustainability. This major new release takes a significant step forward in user-friendly features and visibility to identify empty running, which leads to environmental benefits and the ability to save money. Among its many new features, CarrierNet Version 6 has a new realtime dashboard to give full visibility of what is going on in the transport operation with a live feed to events at depots and on trailers as they happen. The dashboard’s easy-to-read needle gauges and charts give a clear overview of important information on such things as empty running, load fill, asset utilisation, depot performance and load builds. Because the live dashboard in Version 6 extracts information from the planning office as well as the database it will show planning changes in realtime for a genuinely live view of what is going on in the operation. This is a real innovation.

SaaS for Logistics Live and friendly in the Cloud

Mark Leavy, Sales Director — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 12:30:59 +0000

CarrierNet Version 6 continues to be delivered as Software as a Service, which means users can gain competitive advantage from the benefits of this state-of-the-art transport management solution without the need for capital expenditure. Deltion has started rolling out the new version to current users and new users will go automatically onto Version 6. Version 6 will have a big impact on the market because it is extremely user friendly, which simplifies the operators’ job while its innovative new features will benefit on a senior management level by making it easier to run the business

Live and friendly in the Cloud – Visibility and Collaboration

Akilen Pandian, Technical Director, Deltion — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 12:26:38 +0000

CarrierNet Version 6 features more advanced transport planning yet is even easier to use than previous versions. It has the ability to carry out planning across several depots concurrently, so enabling collaboration and identification of backhauls and shared resources within a company or transport network. This means that instead of taking a siloed approach, CarrierNet Version 6 identifies what is best for the company or network. CarrierNet Version 6 makes greater use of interactive maps in planning, allowing users to not just see actions on a map, but also to modify them on the map. For example, users can add modes, change resources and get instant indicators of whether the modifications will work to help avoid empty or low running mileage. The live screen map allows a user to look at a route and gauge the efficiency of each part of it. A ‘traffic light’ ranking system will display a leg of the route in green if it is running at what the user has defined as full; it will show amber if there is a load on board that could be optimised; and it will show red when it is empty. Users can set their own parameters driving the traffic lights so, for example, fewer than 6 pallets means empty. In addition, the map identifies what loads are available around that route. This gives the user the ability to eliminate an empty or part-empty leg interactively on the map, which will lead to lower costs and an environmental benefit from reduced empty running. The user, seeing an empty leg with an order nearby can drag that order onto the route, which either accepts it or gives a warning that it might not work because, for example, of capacity constraints or the user maybe placing a frozen delivery onto an ambient truck.

Dashboards – Tell me where I was or show me where I am going?

Denis O’Sullivan, CEO Deltion — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 17:06:55 +0000

Reports and dashboards are all very well, but they do not help much if they tell you that you had a problem rather than you are having one or better still about to have one which you can still avert. This is where the Cloud comes into its own – real time web access to all relevant internal and external Supply Chain and Logistics systems means that you can act and prevent. So much better than find out and apologise. CarrierNet now includes live feed dashboards which show you how you are performing against your own defined KPIs and how you are in comparison to other managers in your group. A powerful way to push up your customer service levels!

Is there a new computer in the truck cab?

Denis O’Sullivan, CEO Deltion — Sat, 18 Feb 2012 15:55:12 +0000

There is a growing call for efficient but much cheaper approaches to track and trace and on-the-road communications. Technology developments in Smart Phones are quite remarkable and the latest models have considerable computing power. This means that major operators, including 3PLs, retailers and manufacturers, can now recruit the services of smaller sub-contractors who were often ignored because of their lack of telematics capability. At Deltion we are launching CarrierNetMobile – an Android based app which provides electronic PoD capability; fleet tracking; and satellite navigation. This is all linked through CarrierNet and integrated with traditional telematics output to provide a total fleet and order track and trace capability. And how much do you have to fork out for SmartPhones? The cheapest Android model we have found cost the grand sum of £35 – including VAT. The mobile revolution is rolling. They will become more agile and powerful and even more suitable for the modern lean logistics operation.

Visibility and Collaboration In Supply Chains

Denis O’Sullivan, CEO Deltion — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 13:21:31 +0000

I have just finished attending The Logistics CIO & Supply Chain Technology Forum organised by EyeforTransport in Amsterdam. Once again the big discussion point was Visibility and Collaboration in the supply chain. There were represnatives from most industries – with the glaring exception of retail – from most European countries. It was the virtually unanimous view that supply chain visibility was key to collaboration and that these were the key to substantial efficiencies, customer service improvements and lower costs. Also more-or-less unanimous was the view that the Internet and Cloud Computing are the only way to achieve this.

Supply chains and the Internet inseparable

Denis O’Sullivan, CEO Deltion — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 15:20:17 +0000

Can you imagine running a supply chain without phones, faxes or email? One where you were dependent upon the mail for orders and information? In this information age, that is truly a business nightmare. But, the time is rapidly approaching when we will not be able to run supply chain and logistics operations without Internet services.

The Internet, with its AAA (anyone, anywhere, anytime) facilitating of real time information, has had a major impact on many businesses and their activities. Logistics operations – always a conservative area of business – have been slow to endorse and embrace the Web. However, Logistics Cloud Computing has now passed the early adopters stage and logistics operators are potentially amongst the biggest beneficiaries in this new web based information world – and British software providers are leading the world.

It is only in the last few years that we have seen a change in the way that the web can be used to provide software services, as opposed to a technology for exchanging information for on-premises software. Most supply chain professionals would agree that key to supply chain integration and efficiency are collaboration and visibility. Essential to these goals is real time information, available to companies, customers, suppliers and their logistics service providers on a ‘need to know’ basis. Attempts to integrate supply chains, instead of creating “best-of-breed” solutions, have in fact usually created “the best which we can cobble together” solutions. Supply chains typically have multiple technologies which cannot talk to each other, and have separate IT support, including CRM, WMS, TMS, In-cab/telematics and handhelds. Here comes the Cloud – there goes the Heat Robinson approach.

The Supply Chain Swivel Chair Syndrome

Denis O’Sullivan, CEO Deltion — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 15:05:09 +0000

At a recent supply chain CEO conference in Amsterdam, organised by Eyefortransport, I was fascinated to hear a new phrase frequently used by German and Dutch colleagues “The Swivel Chair Syndrome”. When explained it proved to be an excellent metaphor for one of the major problems in the modern supply chain – Lack of Visibility.

The point they were making so graphically was that because there was no integration of legacy and newer supply chain solutions, they had to be accessed individually. So imagine the lot of the manager sitting at his desk swivelling between computer screens to try to pull together the information he needs. It is an impossible task because by the time he has found it all, pulled it together and made sense of it – it is almost certainly too late.

One of the greatest benefits of the latest web technologies applied as cloud computing is the ease of integrating disparate systems to enable one source of information and one version of the truth. As companies seize this opportunity the days of the logistics manager’s swivel chair will be numbered.

The view from the Logistics Control Tower

Denis O’Sullivan, CEO Deltion — Sat, 10 Dec 2011 12:00:00 +0000

Welcome to the first post on the Views from The Logistics Control Tower Weblog – aka Blog. We hope to make this interesting to a wide range of supply chain and logistics professionals – not just to CarrierNet and Deltion users. As with all Blogs, this is dependent not only on the Blogger – but also on everyone who posts news or a point of view. Please join in.

There is much talk about the birth and technology of the Web and the Internet. However, you might be interested in comments by the person who first had the concept of an Internet 40 years ago – William Gibson, in his novel Neuromancer. He called it the ‘Matrix’ and later said he had a hunch that the Internet would change things – in the same way that the ubiquity of the automobile changed things. In 1995, he described the advent, evolution and growth of the Internet as “one of the most fascinating and unprecedented human achievements of the century”. Another of my favourite quotes from Gibson is “The future is already here – it’s just not evenly distributed”. I think that is still true related to the use of the Web in Supply Chains and Logistics.