DC Velocity - May 2015

Douglas Battery

1255 Creekshire Way, Suite 221 • Winston-Salem, NC 27103

1-800-211-3684 • www.douglasbattery.com

TAKING CHARGE

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Subject to revision without prior notice. E.&O.E. and president.

RateLinx sells its software exclu-
sively to shippers because it is built
to disintermediate 3PLs from a pro-
cess that shippers can manage on
their own, said Vaillancourt. He has
no qualms about the strategy, say-
ing that most intermediaries already
view his company as a cost cen-
ter rather than a solution provider.
Many third parties “don’t under-
stand technology, and they don’t
deploy it well,” he noted. That said,
some of the bigger freight brokers
offer rating software engines with-
in their transportation management
systems (TMS).

By contrast, DAT sells its rating product, called “Rateview,” to both shippers and 3PLs, according to Mark Montague, industry pricing analyst for the firm. With an estimated $53 billion spent each year by 3PLs to purchase truck transportation on the non-contract, or “spot,” market, DAT sees an enormous opportunity to provide freight rating tools to help intermediaries navigate what has become a challenging landscape in the past two years, Montague said. For shippers, Rateview is important because spot rates are a reliable indicator of what truckload rates will look like when shippers begin negotiating contracts with their carriers, DAT said.

SMC doesn’t sell its Rate Ware product, which has been around since the mid- 1980s, directly to shippers or carriers. In fact, the group avoids performing any sort of carrier rate comparisons because it doesn’t want to alienate its trucking company customers, said Brad Gregory, senior vice president of marketing and software alliances. Instead, SMC markets the product to technology providers like Oracle Corp., SAP SE, MercuryGate, JDA Software Group Inc., and LeanLogistics, which in turn package the software with their respective TMS suites. “Rate Ware sits inside of those products,” Gregory said.

SMC works to pair RateWare with a product called “CarrierConnect,” which it developed around 2000 to supply detailed carrier and transit time information on lane segments chosen by users. The organization is beta testing an updated version of CarrierConnect that provides users with specific delivery dates rather than just a range, Gregory said.

St. Louis-based Cass Information Systems Inc., a freight bill audit and payment service provider that disburses $38 billion in annual freight payments on behalf of its clients, also doesn’t sell its software, which is called “Ratemaker.” Instead, Cass uses it to verify the accuracy of freight charges during the auditing process, according to Don Pesek, director, audit and rating services.