BACK IN THE 1980s, WHEN I FIRST STARTED WRITING ABOUT
logistics and supply chain, the United States’ freight transportation
system was in upheaval, most especially the motor carrier industry. In
1980, Congress had eliminated most of the economic regulation that
had governed trucking operations since the 1930s, and the industry was
undergoing a sea change in the way it did business.
We saw a sort of business Darwinism at work. A sudden change in the
environment put many of the established giants at risk as they struggled
to adapt. At the time, I had a list pinned above my desk of the 50 largest
truckers in 1980. Each time one of them shut its doors, I crossed it off
the list. Few remained when some years later I changed offices and the
list disappeared.
In the meantime, an aggressive group of entrepreneurs set out to take advantage of what had become
true market-based competition and transformed
the freight transportation and logistics industries.
Eventually, the changes served shippers well. The
innovative carriers worked hard to reduce costs, deliver top-notch service, and develop new programs. The
change did not come without a cost, of course. Jobs
were lost, and litigation over negotiated rates dragged
on for years. Like any revolution, it brought plenty of
upheaval.
I think about this now because I am persuaded we
are on the brink of another major upheaval in logistics
and supply chain, spurred largely by technological
developments like 3-D printing, ubiquitous connectivity, the coming of driverless vehicles, and the rise of services like Uber.
One example: In an interview on the Big Think website, Jeremy Rifkin,
a provocative economic thinker, says, “We are just beginning to see
the first glimpse of an automated transport and logistics Internet.” He
describes a vision of businesses large and small forming a massive col-
laborative supply chain designed to eliminate many of the inefficiencies
inherent in today’s logistics networks. We already have some of that, of
course, in the form of the third-party logistics industry that thrived post
deregulation. But Rifkin is alluding to something much bigger and more
revolutionary: an interconnected world embracing technology, energy,
transport, and manufacturing that will fundamentally change econo-
mies—what he calls “the democratization of everything.”
I don’t expect to see such change in the next months or years. But these
are the kinds of changes that can sneak up on a person or a business
or a nation. And some of it—the emergence of driverless vehicles, for
instance—is not that far off. It’s the sort of change that could be exciting
and transformative. You just don’t want to be the dinosaur.
bigpicture
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