My Thoughts on “Smart XPort,” our New Shipping Management System
Hello, I’m Ichiki of Sync Logistics. In this issue, I’d like to talk about the relaunch of our company’s shipping management system.
■Streamlining our complex shipping operations
While shipping tasks where many people are involved and cloud services work well together, when I started in this industry, managing tasks using Excel was the norm.
In Excel, it was easy to make mistakes and omissions. We also could not figure out which was the latest information, and if there were any sudden changes, we’d have to call or email everyone involved. It felt like walking on a tightrope, and I wanted to change this cumbersome way of working.
That’s when we started using Google Spreadsheets. By doing so, multiple people were able to edit sheets simultaneously, changes were being tracked, and the latest information was being shared in real time with the relevant parties. Also, it became easier for us to share and send photos of cars and the vanning process through the cloud which many shippers have been requesting.
■Drastically reducing “overflow” through centralized management
Our operational efficiency has considerably improved since using the cloud, but we felt its limitations such as sheets becoming too slow to respond with increases in management locations, so we made the bold decision to develop our very own system. This was “La-Plus,” which shippers and our partner companies used. This version mainly focused on inventory management and was later updated to “La-Plus 2” which included expanded shipping management functions.
La-Plus 2 has the following features:
- Shipping management
- Inventory management
- Document management and search
- CSV data output
- Change tracking
By redistributing our shipping operations with the system at its core, overflow due to mistakes and oversights were drastically reduced, and we were also able to analyze data through CSV output. Moreover, all users of the system really appreciated the search and download functions for essential information and documents including export permits and dock receipts.
■Smart XPort: our new shipping management system
We are adding a new feature to La-Plus 2, which we have been using since 2018, and relaunching it as “Smart XPort.”
The new feature is the yard entry schedule sharing function. Our API will be linked to a shipper’s system, enabling real-time sharing of when vehicles will enter our yard. As a forwarder in the used car export industry, this establishment of a shipping system after receiving yard entry data from the shipper is the first of its kind in Japan.
By enabling the logistics side to know the yard entry schedule in advance,
- we can obtain an outlook for overall shipping operations;
- we can reserve ships and conduct other arrangements quickly before yard entry;
- we can reduce man-hours and mistakes by eliminating the need to reconcile information;
- we can reduce the need for calling and emailing;
- we can avoid problems and misunderstandings between shippers and the logistics side (such as the number of vehicles for yard entry, etc.); and
- we can lessen the number of erroneous stackings due to misidentification of vehicle numbers.
Such benefits can be expected, and we anticipate that the speed of shipping operations will increase by 20 to 30 percent.
We would like to become a company that can help our clients expand their businesses by focusing more on essential tasks and by improving their operational processes through Smart XPort.
I plan to share more details about Smart XPort in the near future. Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions.
Thank you for your time.
