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Transport Management Solutions

– Shipping Without Slipping
Y
our business is growing,
and the need for effective
logistics and shipping
grows with it. Every day, more
and more customers expect their
goods to be delivered on time
and at the right location. The
need for transports is growing as
new providers and new markets
emerge, and the infrastructure
for transports is expanding,
opening new competitive routes.
But linking together the optimal
shipping route from, perhaps,
thousands of options may seem
overwhelming. Pricing is only one
of the considerations. In this white
paper, we look into the potential
and the challenges of a Transport
Management Solution (TMS).
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 Transports are becoming an
increasingly critical part of the
The issue: enterprise. It might be said that
Why transports transports have always been critical,
but the volume of transports are
are becoming increasing and the requirements
are becoming stricter. There are
more critical several reasons for this:
¡ Sourcing
Raw materials, components and
complete products may now
be bought in many parts of the
world. Nations that belonged
to the Third World only a few
decades ago are now trusted
producers and developers of
hi-tech products. Industrialization
has reached Africa. The so-called
BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia,
India, China and South Africa)
are not only producers and
consumers; they are also building
a new infrastructure for trade in
the Eurasian continent.
¡ Markets
The ”new” nations that sell are also
nations that buy. New potential
customers are no longer found
in the USA or in the EU only. An
enterprise needs to be able to
deliver to the BRICS countries, to
Africa or Latin America.
¡ Internal transports
Company structures are
becoming more complex. Few
major enterprises are located in
one place only, or in one single
country. Goods need to be
moved between subsidiaries at an
increasing rate.
¡ Timeliness
Aspects of the Toyota Production
System, TPS, have been adopted in
many enterprises. It is often called
”just-in-time” and sometimes
understood as ”keeping your
inventory on wheels”. TPS does
not necessarily increase the
total volume of transports, but it
requires timeliness, since delays
could mean that production has to
be shut down.
And, of course, transport costs.
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 Official figures indicate that the
global volume of shipping is
Background: increasing at a steady rate. This
The evolution of should be obvious, considering
the growth of production, but
transports statistics show that the volume
of shipping is increasing faster
than production. The increase in
shipping volumes has a couple
of reasons: products, parts and
raw materials are, on average,
shipped for longer distances, and
modern production demands
higher volumes of transportation
to make the products. Both these
mechanisms are relevant.
Reducing the costs for transports
is, for many enterprises, a largely
overlooked concern. As they say:
”A buyer might spend weeks
looking all over the world for the
best deal on nuts and bolts, but
then he will overlook the cost of
having them delivered.” This is
probably an overstatement. But
a common case is that the buyer,
due to old habits, relies on the
transport options that he or she
is already familiar with and thus is
missing out on the opportunities
to lower transportation costs and
timeliness.
Dependability is not to be
underrated. Delays cannot always
be avoided, but many enterprises
are willing to pay a bonus to avoid
them. It has been estimated that
delays, on the average, add as
much as 25 per cent to the cost
of transports. Add to this the costs
caused by interruptions to the
production process.
However, the shipping landscape
is literally changing rapidly.
Additions and improvements to
both the Panama Canal and the
Suez Canal will make it possible
for larger ships to pass through
these canals instead of hauling
around South America or Africa.
These increases in canal route
capacity means faster delivery
and lower freight rates. Adding
to this, an even wider and deeper
canal between the Atlantic and
the Pacific is planned to be dug
though Nicaragua. New railroads
are being built on the inland of the
Eurasian continent, far from the
sea. And new business models are
emerging for road transports.
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 So why do enterprises not consider
alternative transport options more
The first often? One reason may be that the
challenge: amount of possible combinations
is, in some cases, astounding.
The complexity
¡ Mode of transport (road/train/
of the sea/air)
transportation ¡ Route of transport
chain ¡ Detailed itinerary, based on
current timetables, including
reloading and dock scheduling
¡ Rates and other costs
¡ Time needed
¡ Border controls, tariffs
¡ Regulatory concerns
¡ Environmental concerns
¡ Existing contracts with service
providers
The number of possible
combinations may appear
staggering. It could make the
classical ”Traveling Salesman”
problem seem trivial. The
enterprise probably has all of
the information needed, or most
of it, in its databases. But are the
databases compatible, or does it
take manual dexterity – and time
– to put the puzzle together? And
are the databases kept current?
There are advantages for sticking
to the shipping service providers
you are familiar with and have
worked with for, perhaps, decades.
Even so, having found a more
inexpensive option could give
your enterprise leverage the next
time you’re negotiating the rates.
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 Transport Management Systems,
TMS, definitely do simplify things.
The IT solution: They are perhaps not an option
Letting for small businesses, but when
an enterprise’s transport budget
computers find reaches a certain size, perhaps
500,000 dollars per year, a TMS
the optimal solution should be given serious
choices consideration.
A fundamental functionality of
any serious TMS solution is to
pull and collect all the relevant
information together in what is
effectively, if not physically, one
big database, including such
information as timetables, rates,
tariffs and existing contracts and
many other types of data. The
simplest way this is achieved is
through open APIs provided by
various parties taking part in the
global shipping system; these
may include service providers,
custom authorities, regulatory
bodies and more. A TMS makes
it easy to evaluate different
shipping options and to find
the optimal one, whether the
primary concern is timeliness or
reduced cost. A TMS makes it
superfluous to copy necessary
data from a plethora of sources
into a spreadsheet and working
the options out from there.
In this sense, a TMS is a true
spreadsheet killer.
When considering a TMS solution,
it may also be worthwhile to
consider selecting a cloud-based
service. There are obviously
pros and cons, but an increasing
number of enterprises come to
the conclusion that cloud-based
services pay off, since they need
not have employees focusing on
servers, backups and updates.
Finding the optimal transport
solution is the goal. Cloud-
based TMS services, of course,
do impose certain constraints on
functionality (as does any cloud-
based Software-as-a-Service) since
much of the functionalities come
pre-configured, out of the box.
It is therefore critical to conduct
a thorough evaluation, before
choosing one.
A solid TMS system will do a lot
more than just finding the optimal
shipping route. A TMS makes
it easy to keep track of each
transport, each container or each
item on its way. Your company will
be able to evaluate and re-evaluate
transport options continuously.
Data can be transferred to and
from all involved parties in real
time: the driver, the customer,
the pick-up location. Sensors
in the packaging can provide
continuous information about the
state of the goods, for example
temperature or if the package has
been tampered with or damaged.
A cloud-based TMS solution will
enable these capabilities and,
once implemented, it will operate
more or less automatically.
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 Gartner™, the well renowned
analysts company, has evaluated
Your choice: TMS vendors for nine consecutive
Selecting years. In 2015, nine providers
were classified in Gartner’s
the best TMS Magic Quadrant. The quadrant
rates companies along two axes,
system for your defining four squares.
enterprise The two axes are Completeness of
vision and Ability to execute.
The resulting four classes are
Leaders, Challengers, Visionaries
and Niche Players. Most providers
are aiming for the class Leaders,
even if they are not there yet.
¡ SAP’s
In 2015, Gartner rated Oracle, JDA
Software and SAP as “Leaders”.
Among them, Oracle with its OTM
product has the highest rating,
and has been in that position
for all of the nine years Gartner
has been conducting their TMS
¡ Challengers are MercuryGate
market analysis.
¡ Among JDA Software’s
strengths, is that their system
is very comprehensive. Almost
all its customers are large
enterprises with a 100 million
dollar transportation budget,
or more. JDA Software will work
with customers to adapt their
system to the customers’ needs.
However, this also makes for
quite a complex system.
¡ Oracle’s OTM system is
described as the strongest,
broadest and most mature of
the TMS systems, with a history
of more than 20 years. It is
now offered as a cloud-based
service. It scales well and is
suited for relatively smaller
enterprises. Even so, Gartner
cautions, smaller customers may
desire even simpler installation
and configuration options.
It’s almost beyond saying that
Oracle OTM integrates well
with other Oracle products and
services, such as CRM and ERP.
Transportation
Management, TM, provides
deep integration with SAP’s ERP
system. It also benefits from SAP’s
global presence. For companies
that do not use SAP software, the
benefits are less obvious.
International, C. H. Robinson
and Transplace. “Challengers”
means that they do a good
job, but in a limited field. The
only “Visionary” is Manhattan
Associates. A visionary has great
ideas, but has not (yet) managed
to implement them fully. Niche
Players are Lean Logistics and
INET. They will suit you if your
requirements fit their profile.
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 Unfortunately, choosing a TMS
doesn’t finish the job, much
The second remains to be done after your
challenge: company has signed a contract
with a cloud-based TMS vendor.
Migrating your The main part of what needs
to be done is to migrate your
transportation existing data into the shiny new
data to a TMS TMS. This is probably not an easy
task, although it may seem fairly
straightforward.
For a large enterprise, a 3–6-month
implementation phase is to be
expected. This figure applies to
Oracle’s OTM system, but there is
no reason to expect significantly
different estimates for other TMS
systems. The reason for the length
of the implementation phase is
that a TMS system does not work
with data alone, such as timetables
and rates. A TMS also needs charts
of business processes, workflows,
One such solution for migrating
legacy TMS business model and
About Oracle data is OTM-in-a-Box from Wipro.
OTM and the As the name indicates, Wipro’s
solution works with Oracle’s OTM
Wipro only. Wipro’s pre-configured
solution comes with a selection
OTM-in-a-box of processes, workflows and
solution roles that will be suitable for most
organizations. It also includes
templates for migrating data
handling of payments and
invoices and other processes that
are specific to each enterprise. The
interdependencies of databases,
charts and tables need to be
specified. In some cases, the data
migration process will be a first
time operation: it may have been
only tacit knowledge until then.
Much of the data migration
process is mechanical and
repetitive, and it has been done
before at other companies.
Based on that experience, there is
software available cutting the time
needed for implementing a cloud-
based TMS system by a factor of
two or more. Some TMS providers,
such as SAP, offer applications for
synchronizing the TMS with their
general business applications. But
what is often needed is a solution
for migrating legacy data.
from the current databases TMS
for including them in the overall
scheme of planning, executing and
evaluating. These features help in
expediting PoC (Proof-of-Concept)
and CRP (Conference Room
Pilot) sessions. The end result is a
comprehensive system that saves
time and computing power, while
providing the optimal solution for
the enterprises’ transport needs.
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 As transport-intensive businesses
grow, e.g. e-commerce, so
Conclusion does their need for a Transport
Management Solution (TMS).
Sooner or later, the task of keeping
track of the businesses shipments
will be overwhelming and keeping
up to date with all the options and
regulations makes it even worse.
TMS makes life a lot easier for
transportation/logistics managers
and their businesses. TMS comes
in different shapes and sizes
and it’s critical to select the one
right for your businesses needs.
Gartner has ranked TMS for nine
consecutive years, and Oracle’s
cloud-based OTM product has
come out on top every year.
Wipro’s Pre-configured solution,
OTM-in-a-box comes with a
selection of processes, workflows
and roles that will be suitable for
most organizations.
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Wipro Ltd. (NYSE:WIT) is a leading information technology, consulting

and business process services company that delivers solutions to enable
About Wipro its clients do business better. Wipro delivers winning business outcomes
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across 6 continents. For more information, please visit wipro.com or
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© Wipro LTD 2016 IND/PMCS/JUL2016-DEC2016

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