Route Planning and Transport Management System

Transportation management solution for a company that provides logistics and warehousing services. Solution includes automatic route planning module creation and integrations with business ecosystem.
Industry
Logistics
Team
13 members
Started In
2020
Country
USA

About a Project

Our customer provides warehousing and cargo long-distance delivery (mainly for drop-shipping) and has a separate branch of last-mile delivery service for marketplaces of various sizes. The company needed transportation management and automated route planning software. It has to be integrated with the already existing business systems.

Goals set to Cleveroad

  1. Automation of route planning to optimize employees’ workflow
  2. Developing the transportation management system
  3. Solution’s integration with existing logistic management system

Solutions we’ve delivered

  1. Creation of a flexible and highly customized solution including automated route planning with manual adjusting option and control module. Developing a drivers’ mobile app to navigate through the custom routes
  2. Creation of a turnkey transportation management software solution to automate control of fleet, delivery points, and all other stages of the supply chain in the company
  3. Transfer of warehouse data from the customer’s warehouse management system (WMS). Creation of a “Jobs for delivery” module, its integration with warehouse and customer relationship management systems

Results for the Customer

  1. The total delivery time optimization and loss minimization
  2. Overhead reducing, covering all logistics processes in the company with a single system
  3. Growth of the return on each vehicle unit and increasing the whole gross profit

Project Goals

We had to automate the route planning, create transportation management system, and integrate it to existing business solution

Automation of route planning to optimize workflow

It was imperative to automate these operations and create a special module for them. At the same time, transportation management system solutions had to preserve the possibility for fleet managers and dispatchers to build a custom route.

Developing the transportation management system

We had to provide a software platform covering all processes, including the cargo transportations settings, employees’ workflows, the fleet control, and the Last Mile Delivery service. All data must be processed in real-time.

Solution integration with logistic management system

The company had an established business process with customer relationships, warehouse management, and HR systems. We had to integrate our solution into it, achieving smooth interactions without data items duplication or failures.

Project in Details

The transportation management platform was developed from scratch and integrated with the business systems in use

Route planning module development:

  1. Existed route planning solutions were not automated at all. Therefore, transportation management was performed with a high risk of human factor mistakes. We’ve rebuilt the route planning process and made it auto-suggested.
  2. We’ve also provided the company’s dispatchers and fleet managers with the option of routes’ adjusting. After completing a transportation management system project, they can correct the path manually in navigation issues or lack ready-made maps.
  3. We have developed a mobile application for truck drivers as one of our transportation management software solutions. The route planning app provides drivers with the scope of navigation features, as was required.

Transportation management software development:

  1. We’ve created a role-based controlled access system for company staff. It allows onboard employees as TMS users, grant permissions, and manage access levels. Users can be added from the HR system directly. The solution allows editing employees’ info and adding custom users.
  2. We also have developed a Fleet Management module. It allows creating groups of vehicles used in the whole transportation workflow; they can be adapted to changing business processes. Bulk uploads of vehicle data in CSV format are also included in the solution’s functionality.
  3. We’ve created a delivery points management module. It allows users to define everyday work locations and see real-time data as it changes. We have provided flexible adding and editing of basic and custom delivery points to configure parameters meaningful for the delivery process.

Integrations with existing logistics management system:

  1. We’ve created a complete transfer of warehouses’ information from the customer’s WMS to our system. We’ve provided a data pull-in via the “all by one-click” feature (CSV upload). It allows users to add data easily, validate it, and avoid labor-consuming one-by-one input.
  2. We’ve created a “Jobs for delivery” module to establish integration with customer’s WMS. The transportation management services solution supports receiving Jobs/Delivery lists and clear data flow with real-time updates.
  3. We’ve integrated the “Jobs for delivery” module with an existing CRM, too. Due to it, all Jobs are reflected in the system, including orders for delivery without involving a warehousing service, last-mile-delivery orders, and some other tasks that come directly from the customers.

Results Obtained

We have developed a full-fledged transportation management system, and integrated it with the existing business platform. Our solution allowed customer to achieve:

The total delivery time optimization

Due to route planning software and custom adjusting, our customer can better process orders and reduce cost and time spent. All itineraries have become realistic and playback; the ability to adjust them manually increased the flexibility of routing.

Total logistic overhead reduction

An indicator decreased by 27-36% due to automation, better control of vehicles and route planning, optimized warehouses’ management, real-time data processing, and covering all logistics operations by a single system.

Growth of the return on each vehicle

It increased due to more efficient truck loading and workflow acceleration in the new ecosystem. Optimizing fleet maintenance, warehousing, and cargo delivery allowed the company to raise its gross profit.