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Project of the month august 2001
Virtual Contact Mart for Carriers and Customers
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By Naia Bang / Texthuset
In less than a year, everyone – enterprise or private customer – will be able to access www.transonline.dk on the Web and hire transportation to bring and ship almost anything from live pigs and garbage to Grandma's cottage piano.
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In the first step transportation companies and their customers will be the ones to benefit from the virtual transportation collaboration, but the intention is to let the concept spread nationwide.
Ordering items and services via the Web is not a big new deal. It is the way it happens that makes it different:
The customer will be able to access our Web site and complete a transportation inquiry. Here the customer enters the type and size of the goods, the place of collection, the destination, and the time windows for collection and delivery of the goods. Once the form is completed, those carriers with available capacity who are closest to the place of collection at the time of collection - will appear on the screen. The customer can then decide to submit an inquiry to three of the carriers. Within the hour the customer will have found the cheapest offer, and he can hire that carrier for the job, explains Henning Lynge, section leader of Dansk Transport & Logistik for North Denmark.
He has been hired as a project manager of the "Transport and Logistics Solutions for E-Business" project under the Digital North Denmark. Six transportation companies based in North Denmark are involved in this project: Peter Sørig Erhvervsrenovation, Frederikshavn, FA. Kurt Larsen, Kraghede, Karl Kristensen, Gistrup, Niels Pedersen og Sønner, Aalborg SV, Continent Transport ApS, Tranum, and Brd. Overgaard Transport, Hadsund. They have teamed up with the AMU Aalborg - the Labour Market Education of North Denmark and the LH Comlog softwarehouse, Aabybro, to create a virtual contact mart for transportation companies and their customers. The goal is to save the environment and enable a better economy to customers and carriers.
- No doubt this will boost the competitiveness of the carriers involved, points out Henning Lynge, who has been working with Torben Pedersen, consultant of the Danish Employers' Confederation for Business, Transportation and Service, the AHTS of Nordjylland as the architects behind a great part of this project.
Not users of IT
One could be lead to believe that the important part of the project is to create the Portal, which will be named www.transonline.dk. However, there is another task, which is equally important.
- There is no tradition of using IT technology in the transport industry. IT is widely deployed, also in minor transportation companies, but primarily for accounts etc. In the small companies the wife often takes care of that while clerks are hired in larger companies. The proprietor and his drivers are normally not using IT technology in their jobs. So in the first stages we must offer carriers, haulage contractors and their drivers the opportunity to familiarize with the IT technology. This is simply a prerequisite for using the portal – and joining the project, Henning Lynge declares.
So the AMU-Center Aalborg plays an important role, too. Not only has the AMU got the experience in the training of drivers already – they are also experienced in helping adults with reading and writing difficulties.
- Among the drivers is a group challenged with dyslexia - as in so many other lines of manual work. This could be a stumbling block if one has to use IT, explains Henning Lynge, who is prepared to provide special training in reading and writing to drivers in a collaboration with the SID trade union. |
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Karl Otto Kristensen, haulage contractor of Gistrup, is one of the participants involved in the "Transport and Logistics Solutions for E-Business" project . He has already deployed the IT technology in his work and is looking forward to the launching of www.transonline.dk.
Photo: Jesper Dall, PF
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"World Premiere" in March 2002
Since early 2001 when the "Transport and Logistics Solutions for E-Business" was selected as a Lighthouse project of the Digital North Denmark, a task group has been struggling to determine the contents of the portal, and how it was made as simple and easy to use as possible. This work was completed in June, and now LH Comlog A/S and TransSoft, another IT enterprise, have initiated development.
Along with them several other software houses are working as subcontractors to help solving practical problems.
And they have had plenty to do. On October 1 the www.transonline.dk was scheduled for internal test - by the carriers and their customers. Within the following quarter any "children's diseases" should be detected and fixed, and optimistic Henning Lynge hopes that the Web page will be open to the public in the first quarter of 2002.
More Participants are Welcome to Join in
While the Web site is getting ready for an official opening, the project team members will be busy in courses. Already in October in parallel to the internal premiere of the portal, project management and the AMU invite all drivers and transportation contractors involved in the projectet to an open house at the AMU-Center Aalborg. Here the Web site and its potentials will be rolled out, and the AMU will present the possibilities for the participants to upgrade their skills in Danish reading and writing and IT technology. After this day the first courses in reading and writing are scheduled for start.
- In November we will repeat the open house arrangement at the AMU-Center Aalborg – but this time it will be for all the transportation companies of he region. We are hoping to get as many people as possible involved – and as soon as possible - in order to be capable of covering all areas within the transportation industry, explains Henning Lynge.
In January and February 2002 everyone who wants to be in on the project will receive an offer for IT training. The AMU-Center Aalborg is offering two courses with the duration of a week: PC User 1 and 2 and a brief tailored introductory course for those who find difficulties in facing a whole week at school. On a long term basis the intention is to offer distance learning programmes to drivers and haulage contractors who want to be in on the system.
GPS and Laptops
While GPS technology has been deployed for some time within the area of passenger transport – for example by Aalborg Taxi – this is a new tool to many haulage companies. GPS is short for Global Positioning System, and is basically a system by which the transportation contractor can pin-point exactly where his vehicles are located – using satellite technology. And the driver can use the GPS to find his way.
The first haulage contractors of North Denmark have already started using GPS technology, but more will follow in a near future.
For haulage contractors involved in www.transonline.dk, GPS is an extra benefit: Unlike their colleagues they will not need to enter their routes all the time – the GPS device will automatically transfer the position of the vehicle to the Portal. The transportation contractor only needs to enter whether he has any loading capacity available.
If Anders who is living in Holbergsgade, Aalborg, wants his furniture moved to the Ravnsbjergkollegiet hall of residence in Århus, he can visit www.transonline.dk and be presented to a choice of 10 removers available. Those with GPS will be heading the list.
- Once the customer has submitted his inquiry he will want a quick answer. So we require the contractors to be online – or at least that they check their e-mail every thirty minutes. To the small sole proprietorships this means that the they must bring a laptop in their vehicle and have it connected to the Internet. Today this is no problem anyway, explains Henning Lynge:
- To the haulage contractor this extra effort should be compensated by a better utilisation of the capacity – and in turn an increased profit. This again should make it cheaper to the customers. And it provides an environmental benefit resulting in less trucks on the roads with empty capacity . To cut it short: Everybody is going to gain from this!
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For haulage contractors involved in www.transonline.dk, GPS is an extra benefit: Unlike their colleagues they will not need to enter their routes all the time – the GPS device will automatically transfer the position of the vehicle to the Portal. The transportation contractor only needs to enter whether he has any loading capacity available.
To learn more about the "Transport- og logistikløsninger til e-handel" project, please look here. |
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