FourKites Closes a Record-breaking 2021 at the Forefront of Supply Chain Visibility

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FourKites®, the world’s leading real-time supply chain visibility platform, today announced a year of record growth as the company executed on its vision to build automated, interconnected and collaborative global supply chains that span transportation, warehouses, stores, trucks and more. The company saw triple-digit growth in total shipments and shipments by mode; drove 50% growth in new customers – including Barilla Group, Beyond Meat, Cardinal Health, Haworth, Kwik Trip, LyondellBasell, McCain Foods, Roehm, Rove Concepts and Yamaha Motors; significantly expanded its carrier network; and extended real-time visibility to more than 2,800 ports and 2.5 million facilities worldwide.

More specifically, in 2021 FourKites saw:

  • 105% growth in total shipments, having tracked over 112 billion miles and computed over 5 billion estimated times of arrival
  • Significant multimodal volume increases, with 5X growth in ocean volume; 161% growth in rail volume; and 116% growth in air volume
  • 126% growth of its global carrier network to over 600,000 carriers, as well as a 50% increase in downloads of its CarrierLink mobile app for drivers
  • Significant growth in Europe, with 148% growth in shipment volume; 2X new customers; and 35% growth of its carrier network
  • 120% growth in APAC shipment volume, now tracking loads in 42 countries, with 50% growth in its regional carrier network
  • A $100 million financing round that included several strategic new investors who share FourKites’ vision for the future of digital supply chains, including Thomas H. Lee Partners, L.P., with participation from Qualcomm Ventures, LLCVolvo Group Venture Capital AB and Zebra Technologies

Alleviating disruptions with innovative solutions for every mode

Amid another year of constant supply chain disruption, FourKites doubled-down on its customer-driven innovation model, with more than 65 new features in FourKites’ platform resulting from customer feedback. These industry-first capabilities help FourKites users track shipments end-to-end across all modes and geographies, from sourcing to manufacturing to final destination.

  • FourKites’ newly patented Smart Forecasted Arrival (SFA) capability, based on breakthroughs in artificial intelligence and machine learning, brought real-time visibility to loads that previously couldn’t be tracked, providing ETAs on 97% of untracked loads.
  • Dynamic ETA® for Ocean now provides shippers, carriers and 3PLs with the market’s most accurate ETAs for 100% of their ocean shipments across all lanes worldwide, with powerful new tools for mitigating demurrage and detention risks. FourKites now covers 98% of global ocean traffic.
  • Dynamic ETA® for Air has revolutionized the tracking of air shipments by enabling real-time visibility into 100% of air freight, with extremely accurate and predictive ETAs, so the supply chain can protect its investments in a critical but expensive mode of transport.
  • A major upgrade to Dynamic Yard® enables highly accurate and granular data down to the level of individual SKUs, so inventory can be located more quickly and disruptions resolved proactively. Customers are seeing up to 30% improvement in workforce efficiency, 40% better dock throughput, and 40% to 80% reduction in detention costs.
  • Order Intelligence Hub integrates order data, multi-modal load information, yard shipments, inventory visibility and other critical third-party systems to provide a new single-pane-of-glass view of the entire lifecycle of every order.
  • Powerful new collaboration features – including Instant Messaging, an updated CarrierLink mobile app and enhancements to Partner Hub, its self-service, secure GPS onboarding solution – are helping shippers, carriers and brokers work together to increase customer satisfaction, reduce costs and improve on-time delivery performance.

Forging powerful new partnerships to accelerate end-to-end visibility

In 2021, FourKites forged new strategic partnerships with global supply chain and technology leaders as it continues to execute on its bold vision for the future of digital supply chains, where automated, interconnected and collaborative supply chains are optimized by real-time visibility data and machine learning.

New partnerships in 2021 include a global partnership with Zebra Technologies Corporation (NASDAQ: ZBRA), in which Zebra is now reselling FourKites’ Dynamic Yard and real-time visibility platform as part of its suite of asset visibility solutions. Additionally, Zebra’s MotionWorks Yard solution has been integrated with Dynamic Yard and Zebra locationing hardware and professional services to increase the in-yard and over-the-road capabilities of its customers. FourKites also partnered with Consumer Brands Association’s new Supply Chain Health and Performance Task Force, which includes 15 leading CPG companies that use FourKites to identify shared bottlenecks and inefficiencies. The company also announced a strategic partnership with DAT Freight & Analytics that will bring FourKites’ real-time, end-to-end supply chain visibility to DAT’s 10,000+ broker customers and 100,000+ carriers to enable them to enhance equipment utilization, increase driver productivity and run an efficient, sustainable freight network.

“It’s been another year of tremendous challenges, but also extraordinary collaboration and progress as a supply chain community,” said FourKites founder and CEO Mathew Elenjickal. “Behind each FourKites success and innovation are tenacious and passionate employees, customers and partners who continue to redefine what’s possible. I’m grateful to be part of such an awe-inspiring community.”

FourKites’ market leadership was recognized in 2021 via several prestigious industry awards and reports, including being named a Leader in the 2021 Gartner Magic Quadrant for Real-Time Transportation Visibility Platforms; #1 supply chain visibility software provider in G2’s Winter Grid® based on overall Market Presence; the sole supply chain company named an AI Trailblazer by Everest Group; one of four Transportation and Logistics companies to receive Inc.’s Best in Business Award; and recognition as a leader in CB Insights’ recent Pharmaceutical Supply Chain ESP Vendor Assessment Matrix.

 

Customers in their own words

“I’ve engaged with the FourKites team and they have a fundamental, deep interest in the problems that we have. It’s tough to find that. Your business is dynamic, you need a partner that’s dynamic too.”
Tom France, Vice President, Global Distribution, Logistics and Transportation, Trane Technologies

“With FourKites, we have all the information we need in one single reliable source, in real time. Knowing the variations of ETAs in real time allows us to better manage our inventories – even reducing the percentage of safety stock of some raw materials so we can change to plan for just-in-time production. This connection that exists between planning and reliable transit times allows us to be prepared for any change in volume, either up or down, and – above all – to attend to the urgency that we may have in production changes.”
Fernanda Ongay, Transportation Manager, Constellation Brands

“The collaboration that we’ve talked about in logistics for 20 years is now real. The more you can collaborate and integrate with your carriers, the more effective you’ll be delivering to your customers’ expectations, which is, in the end, what it’s all about. FourKites is more than just track-and-trace; it’s about the visibility and how we’re going to use it to start to drive efficiencies.”
Paul Avampato, Head of International Logistics, Henkel