It built its success on catering for bigger firms, now the TransLogix group, which boasts over 400 clients supported by a team of 70 staff across four offices in Australia, is targeting smaller operators.
It wants to help smaller businesses move with the modern times, smoothing out their operations with the help of new technology.
Managing Director Anselm Waterfield joined the company in 1995 and believes more transport companies are growing profits thanks to the application of information technology. He says “if you’re not riding the wave of change… you’ll find yourself beneath it”.
“What I expect in the next 12 months is that there will be a suite of applications that Translogix brings into the marketplace towards small business and delivers a software cloud environment where we can help those organisations participate more fully with the rest of the supply chain,” Waterfield says.
The company has proven to be a consistent leader in delivering fully integrated transport logistics software solutions, attracting up to 40 clients each year including 30 during the great financial crisis two years ago.
Its clients now range from small family-run businesses to bigger providers such as Greenfreight, Wickhams and Kagan Logistics.
TransLogix’s game is to provide solutions to address increasingly complex information transfer issues in the supply chain. Such transfers often involve multiple carriers, suppliers and customers all demanding increased reliability and visibility of resources.
TransLogix believes the focus of its relationship with the customers must remain consistent because what it delivers affects everyone in a business, ranging from the customers to the employers to the suppliers.
“When we go and talk to an organisation that is yet to use the sorts of services and products we have to offer, what we have to recognise is a high degree of trust and risk that the organisation is going through in order for it to make a choice and gain a benefit,” Waterfield says.
“Our job is to do our best to understand what is achievable and what is not within that organisation and help them create a path along which they can be successful.
“If you look at other suppliers, quite often they have business that comes from the industry sectors.
“We think one of the benefits that we have got to offer is the fact that we only deal with one industry.
“That means that our people have a greater capacity to be able to recognise what the opportunities are and to be able to discuss that in a [common] language to the customer.”
TransLogix’s growing profile is based on award-winning technology, expertise and customer service. The business is known for its modules covering accounting, transport and warehouse management, fatigue management, tracking and scheduling.
Earlier this year, TransLogix partnered with Transit Computer Systems to improve services in the trucking industry and expand research and development capabilities.
After all, according to Waterfield, technology never stands still.
“As we are reinvesting in the products that we have to offer, what we are investing is in line with changes that are driving the industry. If you think of chain responsibility or management of fatigue, over time we are seeing regulation is creating greater demands on the businesses to perform in a particular way,” Waterfield says.
“Times have changed because there is an increasing expectation from customers that everything is done yesterday; more information is greatly available, there is greater accuracy and quality.”
Tools for the job
Through a “portfolio of tools”, ranging from GPS and mapping technology, item-level tracking, asset management and fatigue and compliance, TransLogix tries to make operation smoother for businesses.
“Automatic rating systems save you money because invoices are right the first time and can be calculated without the potential of human error,” Waterfield says.
“GPS and mapping software make route planning and fleet optimisation simple and more cost-effective.
“Pallet control tied into the operational system helps you to quickly identify what has gone missing and where. Better repair and maintenance systems allow you to plan preventative maintenance whilst minimising the cost of disruption.”
The company recently partnered with MTData, a major supplier of GPS tracking and fleet-management systems, to create a new transport-management system with a fully integrated vehicle-tracking solution.
By creating an Intelligent Access Program system, which uses the Global Navigations Satellite System, it allows transport operators to gain flexible access to the national road network for their specific business and operational needs.
“We try to structure our business so it matches the industry – that goes back to making sure it works in a way that people in the industry that can use it.
“We’re trying to work more with our customers to get more out of what they’ve got.”
“There are 400 customers and they have already made an investment in an asset, we’re trying to work more with our customers to get more out of what they’ve got and there are still lots of customers that are yet to become TransLogix customers.
“Our aspirations are modest; we want to continue to do as good job in the industry and deliver innovation and we want to expand that capability to a range of customers who previously haven’t had access to us,” he adds.
“The technology has got so much room to move, the market can grow and get three times bigger and that is clearly going to see us grow. I don’t see that pace changing as we have made investments in growth and product in terms of people and specialisation, we are more focused and we stuck to that and that’s caused us to be successful.”
It has been a busy year for the company and one that has furnished some glowing endorsements.
In early December, Translogix signed up Contract Warehousing New Zealand and its Australian operation, Contract Logistics, as the latest customers of its integrated Sapphire transport and logistics management suite.
The contract warehousing group has moved from simple trucking and handling in the late 1970s to delivering third-party warehousing and logistics solutions as well as four-party (4PL) supply chain services.
Contract Warehousing founder and Managing Director Rod Giles is on record as backing the Sapphire suite as crucial to his company’s complex service offering. He sees that as a significant endorsement of TransLogix’s technology and service capabilities.
“We can’t afford to stand still. As our customers grow we have to be able to keep ahead of them,” Giles says.
“Our industry is no longer about trucks and sheds; it’s all in the service offering.
“We saw the opportunities that 4PL full-accounting offers and TransLogix is equipping us for it.”
In August, All Earth Group also deployed the Sapphire software suite to deliver a fully-integrated system.
All Earth Group, which operates a waste transfer station in Perth, has a fleet of 80 plant and bulk haulage vehicles and provides a range of garden and landscaping materials, including recycled products.
Its Director of Administration and Finance, Heidi Dauth, says the company outgrew its spreadsheets and “basic” accounting.
“It was time to replace many with one automated and fully integrated system,” Dauth says.
“We needed to know we had integrity in the data we were relying on, we needed better reporting and to reduce revenue leakage.
“As an enterprise owner, your competitive advantage is in your business model and in today’s environment you must embrace technology to leverage that advantage.”
“But you can’t rely on a software to create ideas or your differentiators; we needed an IT partner to meet our business, not to make us fit them.”
In June South East Queensland water carrier H2Flow also chose the suite to streamline its business and optimise fleet use.
To run its fleet of 20 specialist vehicles it needed greater automation of business practices to reduce administrative costs and improve cashflow, H2Flow Director Paul Ryan says.
“We’ve just scratched the surface of what we can do and we’re already the largest carrier in the greater Brisbane area,” Ryan says.
“We’re not just a truck operator, we’re all about service delivery and what we deliver to our clients needs to be the best.
“H2Flow reached the limits of existing hybrid systems which were not capable of growing with us or providing the sophisticated functionality offered by today’s leading technology.”
The new system allows complete visibility between the company’s three depots, with an anticipated 15 percent increase of fleet use per hour, per day.
“H2Flow won the Isuzu Truck Power magazine ‘Truck of the Year’ award and we have the most visible fleet in the market.
“We’ve invested in the best equipment and we expend a lot of energy in providing the best product.
“We now have the back-office efficiencies and functionality to support that public face.”