Low Code Freight Tech - Market Currents #3

September 09, 2024

Table of Contents

This Month’s Topic: Low Code Freight Tech

According to McKinsey Digital, 66% of software projects over $15M have a 66% cost overrun, 33% schedule overrun, and 17% shortfall on benefits.

But what if it doesn’t have to be that way?

Our Outlook

From Curtis:

What will you be building? Low-code has long fascinated me. Why? It’s both a remover of barriers as well as a challenge for non-technical people like myself. The opportunity to build software tools beyond merely a spreadsheet and prove an idea out in something custom designed and programmed is pretty darn exciting.

Don’t get me wrong - this stuff isn’t easy. At least, not the better ones. Retool, Bubble, Appsmith and many others enable the ability for a practitioner in any market to dream, build, test, and validate ideas. What’s the downside? There definitely are some here. There needs to be a balance of capability and constraints, and when you jump in to the world of templates and drag/drop - the customization aspect takes a bit of a hit.

All of that being said - I think that LTL freight is one of the best sandboxes to build and deploy low-code built ideas as there are just so many moving parts involved with pricing, billing and operations. From modeling shipment attributes to rating and quoting - the fact that so much data is only an API call away makes it relatively easy to connect and talk to various data silo’s around the industry that all contain relevant information. The really cool thing is it’s quickly democratizing access to building technology - and given the power of the snowball effect - as more folks get into this, the better it will get. Quickly.

Go forth and build! Let us know what you end up tinkering on.

From Elliot:

Sellers of low-code solutions promise to transform the freight industry. Non-technical employees will do work that once required entire technical teams, floors, or even buildings. C-Suite employees, no longer stymied by their typical lack of deep technical skill (although this is quickly changing), will be able to make decisions and changes at an unprecedented pace. That’s what they claim, at least.

In practice, these tools are not a panacea, and remedying potential gaps and flaws — a lack of deep integration, easily accumulated technical debt, scalability issues — may require more (or more specialized) expertise than users might expect. As always, success comes down to proper implementation.

As with any technology, the success of these solutions depend on implementation and adoption. Leaders who see low-code as a cure-all risk creating more problems than they solve. Leaders who use low-code as a collaborative tool to do low-cost testing and prototyping, balancing their domain expertise with the technical expertise of their peers or reports, will find the most success.

The opinions expressed in the content of this newsletter are solely our own. They do not reflect the views of any affiliated organizations or partners and should be considered as individual perspectives offered for informational purposes only.

Companies & Jobs in Low Code

Greenscreens.ai August 2024 Update

Greenscreens.ai August 2024 - National Carrier Spot Rate and YoY Market Trends

Takeaways

  • Year-over-year is still down for all three modes.

  • The majority of regions are showing negative figures compared to 2024H1 baselines.

  • Southeast markets are leading the downturn at -6.5%, -7.8%, and -1.5% for Van, Temp Control, and Flatbed respectively.

Outlook

Similar to our 2024 July update, weakness continues in all markets excluding the Southwest where reports of increased imports have likely created greater demand for trucking.

The majority of regions show negative figures compared to 2024H1 baselines., thus a pervasive weakness in the trucking markets.  Southeast markets are leading the downturn at -6.5%, -7.8%, and -1.5% for Van, Temp Control, and Flatbed respectively.

For more information, check out Greenscreens.ai.

The Freight Trends Podcast

The Freight Trends Podcast

Click to watch the Freight Trends Podcast, featuring Scooter Sayers & CoForge.

We'd Love to Hear from You!

Your support and curiosity are what drive us to share our insights, experiences, and thoughts in the logistics industry.

Drop us a line with your thoughts on the market, new developments, and new tech.

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Sincerely,
The Freight Trends team
(Curtis, Elliot, Sierra, & Matt)