Choptank Transport, a third-party logistics company headquartered on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, has launched a new customer-interfacing market intelligence platform called Orbit TI.

According to a press release from Choptank, Orbit TI is a value-added, free-access benefit for all Choptank Transport shippers, fully integrated with the company’s transportation management system.

“One of the most exciting features of Orbit TI is the Market Intelligence Center,” said Josh Bergling, vice president of technology at Choptank. “Protected by a secure username and password, customers can access many useful data-driven analyses derived from their own shipping history. Here they can review frequently run lanes and see their related market conditions, including tender acceptance, truck-to-load ratios, weather (even snowfall amounts), and current diesel prices per gallon.”

Another helpful tool Bergling points to is the Capacity Utilization metric that runs all possible configurations of a palletized load on a trailer and reveals a customer’s percentage of utilization. The Stop-Arrival time feature is another useful metric of the platform, he said. This feature gives customers a snapshot of their freight’s arrival times, marking them as early, on-time, or late arrival. Detecting costly problem areas such as long dwell times can be useful information for shippers and receivers alike. 

According to Bergling, the most popular feature of the platform is its Shipments tab. This part of the Orbit TI interface shows customer’s loads in one central location with drill-down features that categorize shipments by upcoming, in transit, at facility, and recently delivered. A tracked shipment can be viewed in real-time on an interactive map that also reveals weather conditions along the route and any stops along the way. Relevant shipment documents can be downloaded quickly, such as bills of lading (BOLs), lumper charges, invoices, and delivery receipts.

The platform also features an accounting tab that houses information such as aged receivables and relevant Choptank documentation that is frequently requested by customers such as certificates of insurance, W-9 forms and the Choptank Transport Buyers Guide.