Founded in 2010, Kale Logistics Solutions creates airport community systems to integrate different stakeholders. The pandemic helped articulate its vision for how the air cargo industry can be digitalised and how it will go from where it is to where it needs to be.
Speaking to Air Logistics International at the TIACA Air Cargo Forum in Miami on 10 November, Amar More explained, “Our idea is to create this airport and port community system platform where the data, instead of being exchanged on pieces of paper, is exchanged electronically. That helps eliminate congestion and unnecessary paperwork, and it brings in a lot of visibility to processes.”
Using Mumbai as an example, Kale has created a community of 2,000 forwarders, 600 trucking companies, 100 airlines, and two chambers of commerce, as well customs and other regulatory agencies, all using a common platform.
Through this platform, companies can talk to each other so that, if a truck travelling to Mumbai with export cargo has nothing to take back for the return journey, they can connect with other companies with cargo in need of transportation to a nearby location. The vision is to connect the communities to create digital corridors, illuminating the supply chain so data is visible to everyone who is relevant.
More said, “That creates a unique digital infrastructure and it is going to change the way cargo is handled.”
Prior to the pandemic, Kale worked with three airports; today it works with 46 airports and seven ports, with More describing the pandemic as four to five years of growth in one go. With people working from home, cloud-based platforms were required. Social distancing being enforced and finding out that the Covid virus can linger on paper for 72 hours made it essential to embrace digital solutions.
More said, “Technology saved jobs because people could work from their homes. If they couldn’t, jobs would have been lost, lives would have been lost – that is what I always say because the air cargo industry kept operating and technology helped in making sure that the industry was cooperating and moving vaccines and all the other medical products. People realised it would not take their jobs away, but actually, it would help them retain their jobs.”
Admitting that it is a controversial opinion, More said he likes regulators because they have helped digitalisation take a step up, giving examples of the US government’s automated manifest system, which allowed people to send electronic messages, and Pre-Loading Air Cargo Information as reasons not to knock regulators.
More explained, “Regulators realised during the pandemic that for things to get moving, we have to digitise. The more the regulations move towards digitalisation, the faster the industry will move. I am a big fan because when it is a matter of regulation, nobody questions whether they should do this or not, they have to do it and if the regulation is aided by technology, it pushes the adoption of technology to a different level.”
More gives three reasons for non-adoption pre-pandemic: mindset, mindset, and mindset, saying, “If it isn’t broken, why fix it? And everything broke down in the pandemic.”
He compares it to the movement of the earth, rotating at 1,000mph but you do not notice it because you are part of it. Only when you step out will you notice the movement, and it is similar for the industry; people are too involved to notice the inefficiencies and that there is so much that needs to be changed.
“Every adversity brings opportunities, and regulation and adversities have traditionally seen technology adoption go up significantly,” he said.
Efficient movement
More co-founded Kale because, with air cargo sitting on the ground for 85% of the time, there was so much value to unlock. Kale helped make Mumbai, the world’s most constrained airport, into the world’s most efficient cargo airport, processing 22 tonnes of cargo per square metre compared to the global average of 10-12 tonnes, without building any new facilities, just by making the existing infrastructure efficient.
By integrating different stakeholders, this changes the way cargo is handled at airports and benefits multimodal services. Kale has received awards from the United Nations because of the benefits it has delivered to the cargo community. At ports, it has reduced container dwell times by 75% and exporters are now receiving tax refunds the next day rather than waiting six to nine months.
“We saw that the supply chain was ripe for disruption and that is where we felt that our technological expertise could help solve some of these problems,” said More.
Kale has done studies looking at truck congestion at airports, a major source of pollution. More said the four main reasons there is truck congestion is all the trucks are arriving at the same time, paperwork is happening at the airport, which starts a queue as the driver goes to the counter to sort out the paperwork, handlers do not know how many trucks will turn up in a time period, meaning they may not have enough or suitable staff for cargo requiring special handling, and truckers are joining the queue when matters such as customs clearance have not been settled or payments not paid.
Sorting these matters out before the truck sets off for the airport saves a lot of hassle, so through the platform, paperwork which would have been processed at the airport is sorted out before departure, then the trucker books a slot so the handler knows what they will receive and have an estimated time of arrival. This has helped handlers plan operations and streamline truck movements.
He continues, “We have been called by several governments because supply chains were broken during the pandemic. A lot of governments wanted to know how to solve these problems.”
What More described as crazy was the resistance when they started implementation, but when it was suggested that they could stop using the platform if they were not happy, they chose to continue because they had realised how the community system benefitted them. It becomes a way of life, said More, and even though there is always resistance to change, people do not want to go back.
“It hasn’t been easy implementing this change because supply chains are more complex than individuals because of conflicting interests. Some people earn money when there is no transparency, some earn money when cargo stays in their warehouses for a long time. Getting people to understand the benefits of technology takes time but when it happens, it can’t go back,” said More.
It has been a struggle to get to this point, but More is heartened by the fact that airports, who traditionally played the role of landlords and left cargo development to handlers and developers, are taking a more active interest in cargo.
Airport community platforms will proliferate and Kale will be working with many more airports in the future.
More concluded, “After a long time and changing a lot of shoes, walking those corridors of the global logistics industry, we have finally managed to articulate our vision where we connect the stakeholders together, convert those communities into marketplaces and connect those communities together via ever-lasting, irreplaceable digital infrastructure.”
This article was published in the February issue of Air Logistics International, click here to read the full issue.