Convoy adds five new TMS partners, making it the most widely available dynamic pricing capability for shippers nationwide

Instant backup and spot rates with 100% guaranteed coverage provide a safety net for logistics teams facing record-high tender rejection

Seattle, WA — August 20, 2020 — Convoy, the nation’s most efficient digital freight network, today announced five new partnerships with transportation management system (TMS) providers. The partnerships with Blue Yonder (previously JDA), FreightPOP, Recon Logistics, Shipwell, and SwanLeap bring the company’s total number of TMS integrations to 12, making Convoy’s digital freight network (DFN) dynamic pricing capability the most widely available in the industry. Through the integrations, transportation teams can instantly book backup and spot freight with Convoy’s real-time rates and 100% coverage guarantee, saving thousands of hours annually and up to 21% compared to spot rates. [1]

Tender Rejection Process Increases Market Costs

Historically, tender rejection by a primary carrier would force logistics teams into a time-consuming and often ineffective process of sourcing backup coverage. After activating their routing guide, load planners would wait two hours on average for each backup carrier to manually identify drivers, collect bids, and negotiate prices. Even when the process is successful, it can take hours to book a single load. And when the freight market is tight, routing guides can fail, forcing load planners to resort to the spot market where they pay a premium for unfamiliar carriers to haul their last-minute loads.

Dynamic Freight Pricing

To address this problem, Convoy announced an innovative approach in 2018 called dynamic pricing for backup freight. The unique approach set the standard for the industry, using machine learning to instantly generate rates backed by a 100% coverage guarantee. With dynamic pricing, load planners save hours trying to cover every rejected tender, and rest assured knowing that their shipments don’t fail over to the spot market. 

By exposing this capability through a secure API, Convoy can integrate dynamic pricing into transportation management systems, giving load planners access to instant rates directly within their existing routing guide. Prior to today’s announcement, Convoy had established TMS integration partnerships with BluJay, MercuryGate, Oracle TMS, One Network, Emerge, Teknowlogi, and Logistically. Since the launch of dynamic pricing in 2018, Convoy has provided instant, guaranteed rates for more than a half a million loads from leading shippers across industries. 

Reduce Tender Rejections with Freight Backup

As tender rejections reach near-historic highs and capacity continues to exit the market, the need for reliable backup coverage is more critical than ever. According to an MIT supply chain analysis, spot rates cost 21% more than backup rates during the comparatively tight market of 2018. With truck prices expected to remain high in the months ahead, shippers without guaranteed freight coverage in their routing guides could face increased financial exposure.

With hundreds of thousands of trucks in its network, plus thousands of smart trailers in its drop-and-hook program, Convoy provides supply chain teams with the most reliable and flexible solution for backup freight. In situations where companies require flexible capacity for last-minute loads, Convoy’s instant pricing and guaranteed coverage can be used for spot freight as well.

Improving Trucking’s Traditional RFP Process

“We’re excited to partner with Convoy to enable our joint customers using the Blue Yonder dynamic price discovery service to have access to instant pricing in their routing guide, enabling them to provide a consistently positive customer experience,” said Terry Norton, vice president, 3PL & Transportation, Blue Yonder. “By integrating our Blue Yonder TMS with Convoy’s digital freight network, shippers will have a more reliable solution for covering their backup freight.”

“Convoy is committed to providing supply chain teams with the most reliable and flexible coverage in the market,” says Brooks McMahon, Convoy’s VP of Partnerships. “With today’s announcement, we expand the reach of our freight network to the tens of thousands of shippers using these leading TMS solutions. And as the market continues to shift in the months ahead, we look forward to providing a guaranteed backup and spot solution for any truckload shipper whose tenders are rejected.”

To learn more about Convoy’s pricing API, go to convoy.com/tms. 

For TMS providers interested in integrating with Convoy, email partnerships@convoy.com.

¹ MIT Tender Rejection Analysis, 2019