Unboxing Logistics Challenges and Opportunities of AI in Logistics With James Sutton From Elevate / Summit Advisory Team
In the first-ever episode of Unboxing Logistics, Lori Boyer and James Sutton, chief analytics officer at Elevate / Summit Advisory Team, discuss the role AI plays in the shipping and logistics industry.
The recent popularity of AI
The rise of ChatGPT has catapulted artificial intelligence into the spotlight. But, as James points out, AI has been driving some of the most popular software and services (like Netflix’s recommendation engine and Uber’s driver selection) for years. “But I think ChatGPT is really the first time that AI is becoming more mainstream, and people are seeing real use cases.”
Three big opportunities for the logistics community
AI has enormous potential for shipping and logistics. James shares the three areas he believes it can have the biggest impact:
- Carrier selection. The best shipping tools “leverage millions or billions of tracking events … to detect a confidence level that a package will get delivered on a required delivery date. [Then they] select the cheapest [carrier option].” This makes it easier to work with multiple carriers and get the most value from them.
- Package tracking. “If you know better where your packages are and you have better data on that, then you can build more solutions to dynamically route-plan based on different capacity constraints.”
- Forecasting. AI can help ensure that the right inventory goes to the right location(s).
A major challenge: developing a data infrastructure
James explains that AI won’t help organizations unless they have a solid data infrastructure built out first. “Most non-data professionals don't really tie these new AI models to what's required underneath in order to build insights. … You have to have your data strategy in a good place.”
Links
- Connect with James on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamesasutton/
- Elevate – https://elevate.dev/
- Summit Advisory Team – https://summitadvisoryteam.com/