The current size of the logistics market in India is $165 billion, which is expected to grow by $215 billion by 2020, considering that freight forwarding will account for 10% of the market. The size of the Indian freight forwarding market is estimated to be around $22 billion.
The freight forwarding industry is said to be a business model prone to disintermediation, with many players aspiring to realise its platform potential in recent years. The traditional freight business model is fairly straightforward. There are customers with goods and suppliers, where they focus on their own core business and entrust a freight company with moving their goods from wherever they are to wherever they need to be. This requires many stakeholders and multiple channels to coordinate and deliver the goods to end customers.
CONTINUED PRESSURE ON THE INDUSTRY FOR MORE VISIBLE TECHNOLOGY:
It is clear that digitisation will be a valid path forward for the freight forwarding market. However, considering how customer appraisal of the market has radically shifted, it may be the only path forward. This is true for the digital era we live in. It is a global phenomenon that affects every aspect of both our private and our professional lives.
Millennials are quickly becoming one of the largest generations in the workforce. By 2020, they are expected to make up 35% of the workforce. This is significant when considered as a demographic that has come of age using online interfaces for business and pleasure. They may, therefore, favour forwarders that use technology to streamline their business practices. Quick freight quotes, online booking, real-time tracking, digital documents are some aspects which help the current market in solving the traditional freight forwarding challenges, which will in turn, favour customers interest in customisation, guaranteed space, competitive prices & time saving
CUSTOMER CHALLENGES DUE TO THE LOCKDOWN DURING THE PANDEMIC
The ongoing COVID-19 crisis has led to a nationwide lockdown, with offices and authorities shut and only essential goods and medical supply operational, which is the need of the hour. Due to this, all of the employees are working from home. But supply chain has to continue for essential goods and medical equipment. Also, customers who are in this business need a lot of materials imported from China, which require quick freight services to move the goods from China to India.
Majority of the importers from the industry are facing issues of high freight cost, long transit, delayed response and poor coordination with multiple stakeholders to move their cargo on time. These are complicated tasks that require a lot of data for internal operational purpose, which are needed by customers, agency, customs and carriers, and are done manually in the system to execute the shipments.
Due to this, they are struggling with their current freight forwarders and looking for some solutions to overcome these challenges.
DIGITAL FREIGHT FORWARDING SOLUTION:
To overcome the challenges mentioned above by importers, we have approached them and associated with them to provide our Digital freight forwarding platform – Fretigo, which is based on date- driven technology which help customers find out the quick freight quotes, choose the best schedule and book their cargo online, in a click, without contacting multiple agents. Since all passenger flights are cancelled due to the lockdown, we advise them to opt for air charter and LCL (less than container load) option, which will work well for them and they get all the charges online and
book the shipments hassle-free.
Fretigo works with top carriers across all major alliances to suggest multiple carrier option with latest schedule, transit time, routing which helps those importers in reducing logistics costs, save time and improve customer experience by creating effective shipment planning that are datadriven & digitally managed and not manually.
Quick freight quote option provides multiple carrier freight with transit time, which helps them choose the best option. E-tracking gives Real-time visibility to monitor their shipment status, E-documents provide the complete commercial documents available online in digital format; Mydashboard provides the analysis of the complete shipments to understand logistics cost expenditure, which are top trade lane. There are multiple reports which are generated based on this data. These reports help to identify the top performing customers/vendors and shipments mode with complete MIS details.
Customers were able to execute their shipments and scale up their operations without compromising on product delivery and the supply chain side, with the help of a tech partner. As more and more businesses continue to grow, and operations/execution become more complex, you can expect technology enablers like Fretigo to stand up and deliver for growing enterprises.
The Case Study is authored by Mr Vijay Kumar Jaiswal, Director – Sales & Network Development, Fretigo
