Voices from across the freight industry are acknowledging National Truck Driver Appreciation Week (NTDAW) from September 13 to 19, marking the event at a time when the trucking sector has seen a swift succession of changes.

After spending more than three years struggling with low cargo rates during a prolonged freight recession, truckers and fleets are finally seeing those statistics start to change. However, some analysts note that the rate recovery may be tenuous, since it reflects a sector with a shrunken pool of drivers, not an increase in freight demand. That workforce reduction has come as the White House has applied a series of policies that forced many drivers out of the industry, such as stricter enforcement of penalties for insufficient English language competency, and bans on commercial driver’s licenses (CDLs) granted to “non-domiciled” applicants who don’t live in that state.

Against that backdrop, government regulators at the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) said they are thanking the nation’s more than 3.5 million professional truck drivers for their commitment to moving our nation’s economy and people forward. “The Trump Administration stands with the hardworking truck drivers of this country. The Administration is proudly committed to taking steps to improve life on the road, reduce barriers, and enhance safety through a package of pro-trucker initiatives, pilot programs, and regulatory updates,” FMCSA said in a release.

The freight broker C.H. Robinson likewise announced a series of events linked to NTDAW, even as it noted the scale of recent change that has swept across the sector. “The resilience of our carrier community never ceases to impress me,” said Michael Castagnetto, president of North American Surface Transportation at C.H. Robinson. “The past year has brought no shortage of challenges, from ongoing market pressure and regulatory uncertainty to broader economic and geopolitical headwinds. Through it all, these carriers continued to show up for customers, support their drivers, and keep freight moving. Their ability to adapt and deliver in tough conditions is what sets them apart.”

And from the fleet operator side of the market, Tennessee-based transportation provider Averitt Express said it would mark Driver Appreciation Week by hosting local cookouts, food trucks and special meals, as well as companywide drawings for electronics, headsets and more. Additionally, each day during the week, a driver will win an assignment for a brand-new truck.

But not all groups see the event as a time for simple celebration. Rather, a labor group called Justice for Truck Drivers held a protest in Toronto that it said was intended to “call out the Carney government’s response to rampant wage theft in trucking.” In the group’s view, new measures by Canada’s government to stop illegal employer violations of labor laws are misfiring, targeting and harming truck drivers while letting employers off the hook altogether. The group said that truck drivers comprise 17% of Canada’s federally-regulated workforce, and yet a disproportionate 85% of all confirmed Canada Labour Code violations have been filed by truck drivers against their employers.

E-commerce and logistics giant Amazon says it has developed a “stronger, stretchier kind of paper” used for shipping parcels, saying the material helps to replace plastic across its packaging network, boost efficiency, and prevent waste.

The Seattle-based company in recent years has rolled out a series of innovations to make its packaging lighter, tighter, and easier to recycle.

At the core of those efforts is a plan to move “aggressively” away from single-use plastics. However, that shift is easier said than done, the company says. According to Amazon, plastic has long played a dominant role in packaging for good reason: it’s cheap, durable, and easy to work with. But it also has lower recycling rates than paper; it can often only be recycled through specialized processes; and recycling plastic is frequently less economically viable than producing new plastic from scratch.

In contrast, the company has begun applying the new material—known as “extensible paper”—to e-commerce packaging at scale in North America. Attributes of this paper include an ability to stretch its dimensions by 5 to 7% before ripping, roughly double to triple the flexibility of conventional Kraft paper. It also molds neatly around whatever it’s carrying and has no problem running through an automated packer.

In fact, related types of extensible paper have been used for years for bags that hold things like concrete and sugar, applications where material needs to stretch under the sudden weight or impact of being filled. And Amazon has been using it in its European operations since 2021, the company says.

In order to test its version of the new paper to ensure it is strong enough for logistics applications, Amazon runs test samples through a lab that simulates the full fulfillment journey of a paper bag. The company says it developed its standard test route in collaboration with the International Safe Transit Association, a packaging-focused trade group. It includes 17 drops and two intervals of shaking over a 90-minute test cycle, replicating the carts, conveyor belts, trucks, planes, and porches a package encounters between warehouse and doorstep.

Now the company has brought that material to its U.S. e-commerce operations. Amazon ships millions of packages a day, so at that immense scale, switching to the new material—or in some cases, avoiding the use of outside parcel packaging materials entirely—can add up to significant improvements in environmental sustainability. Amazon shared statistics that it says show its efforts to date: 11% of orders shipped globally in 2025 in their original packaging; 288 million plastic bags avoided by automated fulfillment machines in North America in 2025; 28% single-year drop in packages shipped with single-use plastics across North America; and 5.4 million metric tons of packaging materials avoided in Europe and North America since 2015.

“We’re on a mission to replace single-use plastics,” John Sly, leader of Amazon's materials science lab testing, said in a release. “You see a lot more brown,” he said, referring to the color of its extensible paper packaging.

Maritime cargo carrier industry group The World Shipping Council (WSC) is calling on governments to address what it calls a gap in international dangerous goods rules that allows containers carrying thousands of lithium batteries to be transported without carriers being informed of the hazard.

According to WSC, the call comes as battery transport grows rapidly and cargo fires remain a persistent risk at sea. Global lithium-ion battery deployment in 2025 was six times higher than in 2020, according to the International Energy Agency, with battery demand expected to double by 2030. And latest statistics by insurer Allianz show that a container ship fire occurs every 17 days, WSC said.

The loophole that contributes to those dangerous conditions is called Special Provision 188 of the International Maritime Dangerous Goods Code, which exempts smaller batteries from certain requirements when they meet specified testing, packaging and capacity criteria. However, it places no limit on how many exempt batteries can be consolidated in one container, WSC said.

Under that policy, a container carrying around 4,200 laptops could therefore contain approximately 416 kWh of stored energy, equivalent to three or four electric vehicles, without requiring dangerous goods documentation or container placarding.

“Right now, a container can be packed with thousands of lithium batteries and still travel without being declared as dangerous goods,” said Joe Kramek, President and CEO of the World Shipping Council. “The SP188 exemption was intended to simplify the transport of individual devices with small batteries, not to make entire container loads invisible.”

To address the issue, WSC said it has been supported by five governments and a broad coalition of industry organizations in submitting a paper for consideration by the IMO. It sets out a potential maximum container-level threshold, above which battery shipments would have to be declared and potentially placarded.

Companies that lease industrial real estate are showing a strong preference for newly constructed buildings instead of older properties, underscoring a sustained “flight-to-quality” trend among occupiers across the market, a Cushman & Wakefield report says.

The findings highlight an ongoing preference among tenants for modern distribution facilities featuring higher clear heights, efficient dock configurations, and enhanced operational functionality.

“Broadly, flight to quality, particularly toward newer space, remains the dominant trend in the market,” said Pat Murphy, Cushman & Wakefield Managing Director. “Many tenants are looking to upgrade from older buildings into facilities that offer greater efficiency, improved functionality, and better support for modern supply chain operations.”

The commercial real estate firm defines industrial properties as those used for manufacturing, warehouse & distribution, industrial, office service, and high technology. In that group, newer industrial assets have captured the lion’s share of leasing activity and positive absorption while older properties continue to experience outright occupancy losses.

As proof of the trend, Cushman & Wakefield pointed to its newly released “Atlanta Emerging Trends” analysis. According to that report, industrial buildings delivered since 2021 recorded 80.8 million square feet of cumulative positive absorption from 2022 through Q2 2026, while product built between 1980-1999 and 2000-2020 posted cumulative occupancy losses of 9.6 million square feet and 10.1 million square feet, respectively.

While direct vacancy among buildings delivered since 2021 remains elevated relative to older inventory, the report notes that vacancy in this segment has fallen sharply from its mid-2024 peak as newer product is absorbed. At the same time, vacancy within older industrial stock has continued to trend upward.

Atlanta remains one of the nation’s largest industrial markets, and the continued outperformance of recently delivered inventory suggests occupiers remain willing to pay a premium for quality as they evaluate opportunities to improve operational efficiency and modernize their real estate footprints.

In the second quarter, metro Atlanta’s industrial market had 10.2 million square feet of new leasing activity and was one of only five markets in the U.S. over 10 million square feet. For the first half of 2026, Atlanta’s industrial net absorption totaled 5.9 million square feet, surpassing first-half totals from 2023 to 2025.

The Swiss provider of automated storage solutions and intralogistics equipment Kardex is expanding its AutoStore operations to Canada, the company said.

The move follows the “highly successful” results of Kardex’ Americas AutoStore operation over the five years since it began, with dozens of deployments of the AutoStore ultra-high-density automated storage and retrieval system (ASRS), involving thousands of robots and millions of bins.

That record has helped to make Kardex the fastest-growing AutoStore integrator, having deployed more than 150 AutoStore deployments across the globe for customers in the retail, manufacturing, healthcare, e-commerce, 3PL, and automotive industries.

In addition to selling the AutoStore automated storage and retrieval system (AS/RS) itself, Kardex says it also sells a number of ancillary systems that enhance performance, increase system uptime, and simplify operations. Those include the proprietary warehouse execution system (WES) FulfillX, automated grid cleaning solution SnapVac, AI-powered bin induction with BinInductAI, and its Intuitive Picking Assistant (IPA), which projects picking information directly onto the AutoStore port.

Although the addition of that AutoStore business new Canada is new, Kardex says it has been providing its own range of proprietary intralogistics solutions and automated systems to Canadian customers for some time.

“Canada represents an important growth opportunity for Kardex AS Solutions as we continue to expand our AutoStore business globally,” Daniel Hauser, Head of Kardex AS Solutions, said in a release. “We have built significant AutoStore experience across markets and industries, and our focus is on bringing that expertise closer to Canadian customers. By combining our global capabilities with strong local market knowledge and support, we see an opportunity to build a meaningful, long-term AutoStore business in Canada.”

Ripple Foods is a startup on a mission. That mission? To make plant-based foods and beverages that are better for people and better for the planet than their traditional counterparts. To that end, the company focuses on unlocking the nutritional power of yellow peas to create sustainable dairy alternatives without sacrificing taste or nutrition.

Founded in Berkeley, California, in 2015, Ripple makes its drinks—milks, protein shakes, and half-and-half—from protein-rich yellow peas, an ingredient chosen for its eco-attributes. Those attributes include low water consumption during cultivation, an area where yellow peas have a big edge over many alternative options, according to the manufacturer. The company says producing almond milk requires 87% more water than Ripple, and producing dairy milk uses 86% more.

That sustainability message has resonated with consumers, and Ripple has expanded its sales across the U.S. But as it continued to scale up nationally, the company realized that to sustain that growth, it needed to enhance its transportation and logistics operations through greater shipment visibility, advance reporting, and automation.

At the time, Ripple was using a legacy transportation management system (TMS) supported by multiple disconnected tools and manual processes. Perhaps not surprisingly, that setup created inefficiencies across its operations, including repetitive data entry, fragmented systems, and limited visibility into shipments, carriers, and costs. Those problems affected the business, since time was lost to manual processes and reporting lacked reliability. As Ripple continued to grow, it became increasingly clear that these inefficiencies were not, well, sustainable. So the company went looking for an alternative solution—one that would offer not just the visibility and reporting capabilities it sought, but also ease of use and a speedy implementation.

​A SMOOTH TRANSITION

After evaluating its options, Ripple implemented Corsair TMS software from Greenville, South Carolina-based Rygen Technologies. As Ripple had hoped, the implementation process proved to be fast and flexible, according to the partners.

Ripple now uses Corsair TMS as its central platform for managing transportation operations, including shipment execution, carrier management, reporting, and inbound freight documentation. These capabilities are used daily by the supply chain, logistics, and operations teams, enabling more efficient and informed decision-making, the partners say.

On top of that, Corsair is fully integrated into Ripple’s day-to-day operations, serving as a single source of truth for all shipment-related data and workflows. This centralization eliminates the need for multiple systems and ensures consistency and accuracy across the organization, according to the companies.

​SOLID RESULTS

By all accounts, the project’s results have proved to be exactly what Ripple was hoping for: “We needed a more advanced and integrated platform to support real-time visibility, stronger reporting, and data-driven decision-making,” Allyn Carfagna, associate director of logistics solutions at Ripple Foods, said in a press release. “With Corsair, we’re able to provide more timely delivery insights to our sales teams and customers, uncover actionable freight analytics, and manage costs more strategically.”

And that’s just the half of it: Since implementing Corsair TMS, Ripple has also achieved significant operational improvements, including a staffing realignment equivalent to approximately 7.5%, according to Rygen. That’s partly because with automation and streamlined workflows, responsibilities that previously required multiple resources are now managed efficiently without additional headcount.

In addition to the efficiency gains, Ripple has realized measurable cost savings, including an estimated 5% reduction in its average cost per shipment, quarter over quarter. That’s largely because increased visibility into lanes, carriers, and shipment performance has enabled more informed, data-driven decisions, improving carrier selection and consolidation strategies.

Looking ahead, Ripple plans to expand its use of Rygen’s software capabilities, including deeper analytics, expanded automation, and continued refinement of the inbound and outbound freight processes.

Safety is essential in warehouses, which are among the most hazardous places to work. Data from the Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) confirm this year after year: Warehouse workers are more than twice as likely to be hurt or become ill on the job compared to their counterparts in private industry. The rate of injury or illness was 4.8 per 100 full-time warehouse workers compared to 2.3 per 100 full-time workers across the private sector, according to OSHA data from 2024, the most recent available.

As a result, most companies put a special focus on loading dock safety—training employees in safe operation, regularly auditing equipment and systems to make sure everything is in working order, and often investing in new technologies that can make the environment safer. These practices are especially important for the truck drivers who move in and out of facilities each and every day and have a unique responsibility to create safe conditions across the logistics industry.

“Drivers have a responsibility to be safe while driving the truck and while interacting with a customer at a loading dock or their place of business,” explains Matt Godfrey, president of less-than-truckload (LTL) freight carrier ABF Freight, which operates 240 service centers nationwide and has a network of local drivers that begin and end each day on a loading dock, visiting multiple facilities in between.

“When [our employees] come into work, we want them to go home in the same condition,” Godfrey says, emphasizing the importance of developing a companywide safety mindset. “And we want to treat our customers’ freight in the same way—[we want it to be] on time, intact, and damage free.”

To that end, drivers need a double-duty education, learning how to operate safely behind the wheel as well as on the dock. Godfrey and others say that training is becoming increasingly important in a fast-moving, high-tech logistics world.

Here are two ways companies can build a safety culture that cuts across both aspects of the business.

​START WITH AN EDUCATION

Developing a safety mindset begins the moment an associate is hired—whether to work the docks, drive a truck, or both. Godfrey explains that ABF Freight’s “city drivers”—who deliver freight from local service centers to multiple customers in a defined area—must be trained drivers and dock workers because about 95% of them perform both duties.

“Our city drivers who are making those deliveries to customer locations, the overwhelming majority of the time they have worked our docks before making a delivery,” Godfrey explains. “So they are very familiar with how the facility works on the cross dock. They have knowledge that is invaluable.”

Freight service centers, where those drivers start and end their day, are places where freight is briefly stored, consolidated, and transferred, a process referred to as “cross-docking.” Godfrey says it’s common practice in the LTL industry for associates to both work the docks and make deliveries (drivers must have a valid commercial driver’s license), making loading dock training a crucial part of any new-hire onboarding process.

“The training starts from day one of onboarding,” Godfrey says.

Clint McCoy, chief operating officer at LTL carrier FedEx Freight, agrees, adding that dock safety starts with the structure of the dock itself—ensuring cleanliness, safe traffic flow, and proper storage and maintenance of equipment, as basic steps—and continues with onboarding and recurring education and training.

“When we hire someone, [they receive a] three-week onboarding experience, which includes classroom and mentor-led on-the-dock training,” McCoy explains. “At the end of that three-week period, if a mentor is not comfortable [with the person’s readiness], they get more training.”

That training continues regularly and is done any time there is an incident or near-incident, McCoy adds. He points to forklift certifications as an example: OSHA requires forklift recertification every three years, but FedEx Freight employees go through the process every two years to ensure that they are up to date.

On top of that, anytime a worker is involved in a forklift-related incident, he or she is required to complete additional training and forklift recertification.

“We take that seriously,” he says, noting that any kind of “near miss” in the truck or on the dock triggers a call with the associate and their manager, all the way up to the director level. “We talk about what happened so we understand, and the employee can understand, what to do differently.”

He says drivers should also be educated on the processes and procedures in place at each customer’s location—conditions that can vary widely.

“Understanding your surroundings and always having your head on a swivel [is important],” he says, emphasizing the level of activity and equipment in motion on loading docks. “You encounter so many different things—some [customers] don’t want drivers on their docks, some want them to help, [and] some don’t have docks, so you have to deliver off the ground.”

Those conditions necessitate a “safety above all” mindset, according to McCoy.

​THEN ADD TECHNOLOGY

Carriers and drivers today can avail themselves of a wide array of technologies designed to help them operate more safely—both in the cab of the truck and on the loading dock. In the truck, forward-facing cameras monitor road incidents to improve visibility into fleet operations and reduce risk, and a plethora of truck telematics offer insight into incidents, driver behavior, fuel usage, and the like. Technology is advancing on the dock as well: Common examples include automated dock levelers and restraints, and sensor-based systems that help control the movement of trucks in and out of a facility—all of which are steadily advancing and finding greater use in warehouses of all types and sizes.

Pilot testing those new technologies should be a routine part of a carrier’s business, Godfrey says.

“All of the technology out there is aimed at making the equipment safer [and] giving more tools to people who are using the equipment,” he explains. “We have great, safe employees, but we want to go as far as we possibly can to augment their ability to be safe.

“We continue to test a variety of products to uncover what is the best fit for us … so [drivers] can be safer out on the road or at a customer’s location.”

McCoy points to truck telematics, cameras, and advanced systems such as collision mitigation and lane-departure warnings as road-safety staples. He says the loading dock is changing in much the same way, pointing to forklift telematics as a key example: Just like the telematics on a truck, forklift telematics systems collect information from the fleet—including data on usage, maintenance needs, operator behavior, and location tracking—that can help reduce accidents and improve safety.

“The safety on the trucks has advanced rapidly over the last several years, and on the dock, things are evolving rapidly [as well],” he says. “There is so much more we can do in the future [on our loading docks]—we are starting to explore those capabilities.”

Such efforts are likely to keep loading dock safety at the top of every warehouse’s risk management strategy.

“We look at every incident as serious—because of the critical nature [of our business],” McCoy says. “We work around things that are very dangerous; one second of inattention can lead to catastrophic outcomes.”

No A/C? Don’t discount the cooling effects of an industrial-strength fan for your warehouse.

Recent research on the benefits of targeted airflow in industrial facilities may help companies alleviate what one industry firm refers to as “the heat tax”— an unbudgeted operational drain that affects worker judgment, lowers output, increases turnover, and erodes bottom-line profitability when facilities run hot.

Such conditions can affect workers in manufacturing plants, warehouses, and other large facilities where full-building air conditioning is impractical, according to the study.

The research comes from the University of California, Berkeley’s Center for the Built Environment and the University of Sydney and was sponsored in part by industrial fan manufacturer Big Ass Fans, which has identified the heat tax as a major burden on workers and facility operations.

The study shows how targeted industrial air movement directly mitigates heat burdens in unconditioned facilities—and essentially puts some real-world data behind the use of high-volume, low-speed (HVLS) fans and directional fans in industrial and commercial settings.

Researchers monitored 30 factory workers across regular shifts at two manufacturing facilities in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, alternating periods with industrial fans running versus fans turned off. Workers rated conditions with the fans running as if the room were about 10 degrees cooler. What’s more, 79% of workers said they worked more effectively with the fans on, according to the research.

With the fans off, 98% of workers said they wanted more air.

“By monitoring workers under real Louisiana conditions, we found that air movement significantly reduced discomfort and perceived effort,” Charlie Huizenga, a founding researcher at the Center for the Built Environment at UC Berkeley, said in a statement announcing the research results.

Separately, Big Ass Fans cited internal market analysis that shows fewer than 20% of U.S. industrial facilities maintain conditioned air, “leaving millions of square feet exposed to extreme summer temperatures, during which labor capacity can fall by 30% to 50% during peak heat spikes.” The company also pointed to separate workplace research that shows overall productivity drops 1% to 2% for every degree indoor temperatures climb above 75°F.

“While full-building HVAC is cost-prohibitive for large open plants, high-volume air speed solutions operate on 20 to 30 times less energy than conventional air conditioning—eliminating massive energy waste while closing the productivity gap,” the company said in the statement.

And that makes a difference for workers and the bottom line.

“When work feels harder and employees feel less effective, the entire operation carries that burden,” Leah Larson, CEO of Big Ass Fans, said in the statement. “This study proves how direct industrial air movement protects worker well-being and productivity on the floor.”

Warehouse robot maker Vecna Robotics has raised $31 million in venture backing, saying that it plans to boost its commercial sales and to accelerate the development of new capabilities as demand for American-made warehouse automation technology soars in the wake of a recent White House policy prohibiting the purchase of certain robots from foreign companies.

Waltham, Massachusetts-based Vecna said the funding will support growing demand and strengthen its “increasingly strategic role in North American robotics amid a shifting regulatory landscape.”

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in July banned many imported robots from sale in the U.S. in a move intended to close national security risks and to encourage domestic robot production. Details were scarce in the brief announcement, but industry analysts said the policy could evidently stop U.S. companies from purchasing many of the foreign-made mobile robot models frequently used in logistics, such as AMRs and AGVs for goods-to-person, sortation, and picking applications.

With foreign robotics vendors excluded from the arena, attention has quickly turned to U.S.-based producers. That is one reason for the timing of Vecna’s new funding. The “series D” round was led by Unless, with participation from existing investors Drive Capital, Tiger Global, Highland Capital Partners, and Tectonic Ventures.

In addition to the fast-changing regulatory landscape, longer-term market forces are also driving demand for Vecna’s products, Vecna CEO Karl Iagnemma said. The company said that demand for flexible automation continues to grow as warehouse and manufacturing operators look to increase productivity, reduce non-value-added travel, and automate material movement without the constraints of fixed infrastructure.

The potential market is huge, Iagnemma said, with an estimated 15 billion square feet of warehouse space in North America alone and market penetration that is “still relatively modest” since the vast majority of warehouses in the U.S. don’t have material handling automation.

Vecna currently meets that demand with its portfolio of autonomous forklifts, tuggers, and pallet jacks, and with its newest product, the CaseFlow platform that automates the labor-intensive work of case picking. The company is now also developing two new product families, saying it is “close to delivering” a system for pallet stacking and de-stacking, and a system for autonomous trailer loading and unloading.

The new FCC policy will likely accelerate demand for those products, although its brevity has raised questions about exactly how it will be applied. “You can’t overstate the importance of that ruling. It was a very short announcement with a potentially broad impact,” Iagnemma said. “Within 72 hours of the FCC announcement, we had a surge of inquiries from customers, both asking about our products and also looking in part how to understand the policy change.”

Travelers using the ride-hailing app Lyft can now choose to call a fully autonomous Waymo vehicle for their trips within the city of Nashville, with broader availability set to grow in the weeks ahead, Lyft said today.

The move marks the first market where Waymo vehicles are available across both the Waymo and Lyft apps. Riders requesting a Standard, Priority Pickup, Wait & Save, or Extra Comfort ride within central Nashville will begin to be matched with a Waymo vehicle at no additional cost through the Lyft app.

The driverless cars are supported by a Lyft subsidiary called Flexdrive, which provides fleet management services for Waymo in Nashville, as well as for Lyft drivers nationwide. Flexdrive will open a purpose-built, 80,000-square-foot depot in Nashville in October.

According to San Francisco-based Lyft, riders can always decline an autonomous ride or opt out of them entirely. Human drivers will continue to serve riders throughout and around the service area, creating a hybrid network of human-driven and autonomously driven vehicles.

Even as the company increases its use of autonomous vehicles, it says it is planning for a “human-centered autonomous future,” saying it continues to see autonomous vehicles as a supporting layer to the existing community of drivers. “Nashville is a hub for travelers, event goers, and visitors, and our drivers here deliver a level of hospitality and service I'm incredibly proud of,” said Yuko Yamazaki, Head of Driver at Lyft. “Demand in this city keeps climbing, and I believe we're strongest in serving more riders when autonomous vehicles and human drivers grow side by side.”

This year’s extended peak season is continuing, with a final bump expected this month that could push September just over the line to be the busiest month of the year for import volume at the nation’s major container ports, according to the Global Port Tracker report released today by the National Retail Federation (NRF) and Hackett Associates.

“We thought the peak season would be mostly behind us by now, but that’s not the case,” NRF Vice President for Supply Chain and Customs Policy Jonathan Gold said. “Some of the shift from earlier in the summer to now is because of vessel delays due to bad weather in China and some rerouting away from the Panama Canal amid potential drought conditions there. But consumers keep buying despite tariffs, inflation, and high fuel prices, and retailers keep bringing in merchandise to meet demand.”

U.S. ports covered by Global Port Tracker handled 2.3 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU) — one 20-foot container or its equivalent — in July, the latest month for which final numbers are available. That was down 3.9% from a year earlier but up 3.2% from June.

Ports have not yet reported August numbers, but Global Port Tracker projected the month at 2.29 million TEU, down 1.3% year over year. September is forecast at 2.31 million TEU, up 9.6% year over year and slightly ahead of July as the busiest month of the year.

As recently as last month, it appeared that May’s 2.24 million TEU would be the busiest month of 2026 as retailers brought in merchandise early ahead of potential increases in tariffs. But high import levels continued, stretching out the peak season to its traditional timing of late summer and early fall.

The Global Port Tracker report, which is produced for NRF by Hackett Associates, provides historical data and forecasts for the U.S. ports of Los Angeles/Long Beach, Oakland, Seattle and Tacoma on the West Coast; New York/New Jersey, Port of Virginia, Charleston, Savannah, Port Everglades, Miami and Jacksonville on the East Coast, and Houston on the Gulf Coast.

Parcel and logistics service provider FedEx Corp. today launched a suite of digital tools designed to help businesses navigate the complexities of international shipping.

The new “Global Trade Navigator” product comes as businesses of all sizes frequently experience challenges when shipping internationally, from understanding duties and taxes to navigating customs requirements and shipment documentation, Memphis-based FedEx said.

For example, according to the 2026 FedEx Small Business Trade Index, 68% of small- and medium-sized businesses regularly see customers surprised by duties at delivery, while 60% report losing revenue through refunds or abandoned purchases.

By addressing those callenges across planning, shipment preparation, checkout, and reporting, FedEx said it enables businesses to reduce the complexity of international shipping.

“International shipping requires businesses to make complex decisions long before a package begins its journey,” said Jason Brenner, senior vice president, digital portfolio, FedEx. “Building on decades of global trade expertise, Global Trade Navigator makes critical trade information and guidance more accessible to businesses as they grow internationally. The result is fewer surprises and a more predictable experience for businesses and consumers.”

Success in freight transportation is no longer defined solely by controlling transportation costs, but by creating resilient, data-driven transportation networks that support broader business objectives, according to a report from the transportation and supply chain service provider Lily Transportation and the transportation solution provider Transervice Logistics Inc.

In a report titled “Beyond the Freight Cycle,” the partners describe six themes in the freight sector, calling them interconnected market realities:

• Liability is rising
• Volatility is the new normal
• Flexibility is the new competitive advantage
• Forecasting is becoming a competitive advantage
• What gets measured gets improved
• Transportation has earned a seat in the boardroom

According to the authors, organizations that improve visibility, strengthen forecasting, embrace flexible transportation strategies, and prioritize safety and operational performance will be better equipped to navigate uncertainty while delivering consistent service.

“For executives, the challenge is no longer finding the lowest freight rate. It's building a transportation strategy capable of adapting to constant change while protecting service levels, controlling costs, and reducing operational risk,” said Doug Adamson, SVP Sales & Marketing, Transervice. “The organizations that consistently outperform aren't necessarily the ones with the largest fleets—they're the ones making better transportation decisions before the market forces them to.”

Despite a dip from historically high levels in June, business conditions in the trucking sector remained strong in July, according to a measure from transportation analysis firm FTR.

FTR’s Trucking Conditions Index (TCI) for July declined to 12.4 – an historically strong reading – after the two most favorable months for carriers ever in May and June. The main variable causing that “modest deceleration” was less upward pressure on freight rates, a change which was partially offset by tighter capacity and lower financing costs.

“While we still see truck freight market conditions as favorable for carriers during the two-year forecast horizon, the period of extraordinary improvement might be over,” Avery Vise, FTR’s vice president of trucking, said in a release. “The biggest wild cards remain whether pressure on foreign truck drivers and other enforcement efforts keep capacity growth in check and whether the buildout of data centers continues at its current pace into next year or beyond. If either of those situations prove to be the case – and certainly if both do – trucking conditions could remain robust.”

Despite the likelihood of those favorable conditions, other forces could weigh down the sector. “Diesel prices are another concern, of course, although for much of the market they are mostly a pass-along cost. However, if spot rates were to soften while diesel prices are at a near-record level, trucking companies might find themselves with an ample supply of drivers who previously worked for failed small carriers. The result could be akin to the sharp increase in truckload employment in 2022 following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,” Vise said.

The TCI tracks the changes representing five major conditions in the U.S. truck market: freight volumes, freight rates, fleet capacity, fuel prices, and financing costs. Combined into a single index number, a positive score represents good, optimistic conditions, while a negative score represents bad, pessimistic conditions.

As warehouse automation continues to evolve, some of the most rapid development is happening in the use of stationary robots with robotic arms for picking and handling tasks—including palletizing, depalletizing, and item or case picking—according to a report from Interact Analysis.

The market size for robotic picking in 2025 was $1.7 billion, and is now projected to reach $4.6 billion by 2030, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 21.7% during the 2026–2030 forecast period, the analyst firm said in its report, “Robotic Picking 2026.”

That quick growth will come from changes in how the market uses these robots, analysts said. In 2025, the bulk of these applications were robotic palletizing and depalletizing, which represented 83% of the total robotic picking market. This is a relatively mature application segment, with robotic palletizing and depalletizing having been used in warehousing for several decades, including in large-scale automation deployments.

However, the market structure is expected to shift gradually over time. By 2030, the combined share of robotic palletizing and depalletizing is forecast to decline to approximately 58% of the total robotic picking market, as newer applications such as bin-to-bin picking and robotic trailer unloading gain traction. Over that period, robotic bin picking is projected to grow at a 36% CAGR from 2026 to 2030, while robotic trailer unloading is forecast to grow at 64% CAGR.

GE Appliances plans to invest $1 billion in a Kentucky factory that makes laundry appliances like washers and dryers, the company said Wednesday.

The plan would expand high-output production of laundry products, according to GE Appliances, which is a unit of the Haier corporation, and to the IUE-CWA union.

More specifically, GE Appliances plans to:

• Invest more than $400 million to transform Building 5 into a high-output manufacturing operation for dryers, bringing production from Mexico to Kentucky.
• Invest approximately $112 million in Building 1 to add new equipment and redesign existing washer and dryer platforms.
• Continue its previously announced $490 million investment in Building 2 to produce frontload washers and Combo washer/dryers that begin production in 2027.

To prepare Building 5 for its new manufacturing mission, refrigeration production would conclude in Louisville in early 2027 and new dryer production would begin in late 2027. After that transition, GE Appliances will continue making millions of refrigerators in the United States each year at its Decatur, Alabama plant, the largest refrigeration manufacturing operation in the U.S., and in Selmer, Tennessee.

Altogether, the approach will establish that Appliance Park facility as America’s largest home appliance manufacturing site, reflecting its scale across production output, employment and campus footprint, GE Appliances said.

As the freight market continues to normalize after a nearly four-year rate recession, brokerage firm C.H. Robinson is forecasting that spot rates in 2027 are expected to rise another 10% year over year for dry van, 11% for reefer, and 10% for flatbed as trucking capacity continues to contract.

That model comes from C.H. Robinson’s September Edge report, which reflects a market where freight demand remains relatively muted in the near term, but transportation supply continues to contract. As capacity exits the market, costs are expected to increase steadily through 2027, even without a significant change in underlying freight demand.

A significant portion of excess freight capacity—the industry term for the number of trucks and trailers on the road—has shrunk in the past year, due in part to White House labor policies. For example, the U.S. Department of Transportation has pressured multiple states to revoke non-domiciled commercial driver’s licenses (CDLs) which it says were unlawfully issued to drivers no longer residing in those states. And the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) has moved to increase the penalty for failing English language proficiency tests to include revoking of a driver’s license.

Such moves have apparently helped to prop up freight rates, but some transportation analysts caution that the strategy has created a “capacity-driven recovery” that may not be sustainable unless demand for freight services also begins to rise.

Likewise, C.H. Robinson’s report finds that truckload rates in September are coming down from their peak in July as uneven consumer spending has kept demand from rising.

“This has prompted a modest reduction in C.H. Robinson’s full-year 2026 spot-market forecasts for both dry van and refrigerated truckload,” the report said. “However, the fundamental story of the freight market remains largely unchanged. Elevated insurance costs, stricter driver requirements, federal enforcement actions, and other business challenges continue removing capacity from the market.”

“This creates a market that remains increasingly sensitive to disruptions. Seasonal events, weather, enforcement campaigns, and year-end shipping patterns are expected to create greater volatility than in recent years because there is less excess capacity available to absorb sudden changes in freight demand,” C.H. Robinson said.

The autonomous trucking technology firm Plus Automation, Inc. (known as PlusAI) plans to become a publicly listed company by merging with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) backed by the private equity firm Yorkville Advisors Global, the company said today.

California-based PlusAI, which calls itself “a global physical AI company pioneering AI-based virtual driver software for factory-built autonomous trucks,” has been making progress toward ramping up its products for market. PlusAI in January said it planned to launch commercial autonomous trucks in 2027. And later that month, it announced plans to team with the commercial vehicle manufacturer Traton Group to deploy those vehicles in the U.S. and Europe.

Today, the company said it is actively operating autonomous freight routes in Texas with Ryder and International and is working with global truck manufacturers, including TRATON, Hyundai and IVECO, to advance its commercial launch of factory-built autonomous trucks integrated with SuperDrive targeted for 2027.

According to PlusAI, its planned merger with the SPAC Texas Ventures Acquisition III Corp. will raise some $300 million in capital, providing the company with sufficient capital to execute its commercialization roadmap and to fund PlusAI through 2027.

Economic growth in logistics slowed for a second straight month in August, marked by cooling inventory levels and rising cost pressures, according to the latest Logistics Managers’ Index (LMI) report, released this week.

The LMI was 66.6 in August, down more than two points from July’s reading of 68.9 and more than four points from June’s four-year peak of 71.1.

The LMI is a monthly measure of economic activity across warehousing and transportation markets based on a survey of U.S. logistics managers. An LMI reading above 50 indicates expansion across the industry; a reading below 50 indicates contraction.

The August slowdown stems from slower growth in inventory levels, which fell more than two points to a reading of 52.8. Companies across the industry had built up inventories in June and have since eased back, driven largely by upstream firms that reported mild contraction (49.0) in inventory levels in August, the LMI researchers said in their monthly report.

Costs pressures intensified during the month, as well, and reflect the effects of recent tariffs and the conflict in the Middle East. The LMI’s three cost indices continued to show “very robust growth” in August, according to the report: Inventory Costs rose nearly two points to 78.6, their second-fastest rate of expansion in 12 months; Warehousing Prices continued to rise, reaching a reading of 75.0; and Transportation Prices rose more than three points to a reading of 90.0.

“Essentially, this month’s report paints a picture of logistics costs that seem to be rapidly increasing no matter what the underlying situation is,” the researchers wrote.

The LMI is based on a monthly survey of logistics managers from across the country. It tracks industry growth overall and across eight areas: inventory levels and costs; warehousing capacity, utilization, and prices; and transportation capacity, utilization, and prices. The report is released monthly by researchers from Arizona State University, Colorado State University, Rochester Institute of Technology, Rutgers University, and the University of Nevada, Reno, in conjunction with the Council of Supply Chain Management Professionals (CSCMP).

In a move that will expand Pennsylvania’s food & beverage industry, the yogurt maker Chobani today announced a $1.2 billion plan to convert an existing food production facility into a dairy product manufacturing operation.

Chobani will assume operations of Keurig Dr Pepper’s (KDP) manufacturing facility, equipment, and related infrastructure, where Chobani plans to manufacture “innovative food products beyond yogurt.” Food production is expected to begin in 2027.

According to New York-based Chobani, the 1.5 million-square-foot facility, located in Upper Macungie Township, will accelerate the company’s ability to innovate and produce the next generation of better, more wholesome foods while creating new opportunities for Pennsylvania workers, farmers, and suppliers.

When fully operational, the facility is expected to process more than three billion pounds of Pennsylvania milk annually — equivalent to approximately 30% of all milk currently produced in the Commonwealth — the largest increase in demand for Pennsylvania dairy in the state’s history. The project will create a significant new market for the Commonwealth’s family dairy farms, helping them grow and strengthen their businesses for generations to come.

Business leaders in the state called the project the largest ever private investment in Pennsylvania’s agriculture industry, and predicted it will create 900 full-time jobs over the next five years in the Lehigh Valley and greatly expand markets and opportunities for more than 4,000 dairy farmers in Pennsylvania.

The Canadian supply chain software firm Descartes Systems Group is continuing its run of acquisitions, announcing today that it has paid $120 million to buy California-based Extensiv, a provider of warehouse management and fulfillment solutions for third-party logistics providers (3PLs) and the brands they serve.

According to Ontario-based Descartes, the move adds to its warehouse and inventory management capabilities while deepening its reach into the 3PL and ecommerce fulfillment market. Extensiv helps 3PLs better manage inventory, orders, B2B and B2C fulfillment, and billing across a connected network of sales channels, ecommerce platforms, online marketplaces, and carriers.

"3PLs are under constant pressure to fulfill faster, scale flexibly, and support the evolving needs of modern brands," said Mikel Richardson, GM, Ecommerce Operations at Descartes. "Descartes has long been a trusted technology provider for 3PLs. Extensiv strengthens that position by adding more participants, more contextually rich operational data, and fulfillment intelligence to the Descartes Global Logistics Network.”

Global logistics provider DHL Group today said it has completed a corporate reorganization that will see the global operating group represented by an entity called DHL AG, while the company’s Deutsche Post AG unit continues to represent the German mail and parcel business.

Specifically, the publicly listed parent company now operates as DHL AG. DHL AG assumes responsibility for the strategic management, governance, and cross-divisional functions of the globally operating Group, while the Post & Parcel Germany business is managed as a separate legal entity. Germany's mail and parcel business will continue to operate under the familiar name Deutsche Post AG, which remains a subsidiary of DHL AG and an integral part of the Group.

Company leaders said the move aligns the group's legal organization more closely with its international business footprint. The new structure more clearly reflects how DHL Group operates today: as a global logistics company with five divisions structured as separate legal entities: Express, Global Forwarding, Supply Chain, eCommerce, and Post & Parcel Germany. Post & Parcel Germany will continue to operate under the name Deutsche Post AG, remaining responsible for the domestic mail and parcel business while also serving as a key pillar of DHL Group's e-commerce growth strategy.

Despite the reorganization, executives said that customers would see very little change. For customers, everything remains unchanged: deliveries, retail outlets, automated postal stations, parcel lockers, mailboxes, products, and points of contact remain the same. And in Germany, Deutsche Post remains what it has always been: a reliable partner for mail, parcels, and universal postal services

Escalating costs are squeezing U.S. delivery operators, with many saying costs are rising faster than revenues in 2026, according to research from delivery management platform FarEye, released this week.

More than 45% of U.S. operators surveyed said delivery costs are rising faster than revenues, while another 42% said the two are growing at roughly the same pace. Seven in 10 operators ranked fuel among their biggest cost pressures and more than half pointed to driver cost and availability as key pressure points. Rounding out the top three cost concerns was vehicle operation costs, cited by 40% of respondents.

The information comes from Eye on the Last Mile America 2026, FarEye’s study of delivery economics, customer promise, network control, technology adoption, and operating models across U.S. enterprises.

The report also found what researchers termed a “striking divide” in how operators are absorbing all the pressure. Delivery organizations with greater control over their networks reported 95% on-time performance, compared with just 65.5% among low-control organizations. Those with greater control also reported lower median cost inflation—8.3% versus 14.5%—despite similar median investment levels, according to the research.

“Delivery operators are being squeezed from both sides—core operating costs remain high while networks themselves are becoming more complex,” Kushal Nahata, CEO and co-founder of FarEye, said in a statement announcing the findings. “What is particularly significant is that higher-control organizations are reporting 95% on-time performance and lower cost inflation without materially higher investment. That tells us the next advantage will not come simply from spending more or promising faster delivery. It will come from having the control to make better decisions across every carrier, fleet, and customer promise.”

The report also found that delivery networks are becoming more fragmented, that predictability is being prioritized over speed, and that AI is on the rise:

• 57% of respondents said they operate hybrid delivery networks—meaning they combine owned and outsourced delivery capacity; 47% of hybrid operators said they plan to increase outsourcing.
• 55.7% said they prioritize predictability or first-attempt success compared with 11.4% prioritizing maximum speed.
• 66.3% said they are implementing or operating AI, up from 46.2% in 2025.

“Overall, the findings point to a U.S. last-mile market where cost pressure is becoming structural, networks are becoming more fragmented, and certainty is becoming more valuable than raw speed,” according to FarEye. “The emerging advantage is not simply promising more. It is keeping the promises that matter, while keeping the economics of those promises under control—the central thesis of Eye on the Last Mile America 2026.”

Parcel delivery and logistics giant UPS Inc. on Monday said it is continuing to reconfigure its network to adjust to a future with drastically less of the high-volume, low-profit margin revenue that it had previously drawn from delivering floods of e-commerce packages for Amazon.

That evolution continues the trend discussed a month ago, when the Atlanta-based company on July 28 announced second-quarter 2026 consolidated revenues of $22.8 billion, with consolidated operating profit of $930 million. In delivering those numbers, UPS CEO Carol Tomé noted the company’s progress over the past 18 months in completing its “Amazon glide down and related network reconfiguration initiatives,” which included a workforce reduction plan to employ fewer drivers in the new reality of a smaller, leaner—but more profitable—flow of deliveries.

At the same time, Amazon has been reshaping itself this summer for a new future through moves like opening its own private logistics network to all shippers and expanding its less-than-truckload (LTL) freight carrying service to all customers.

The same theme of a breakup between the two heavyweights continued today as UPS said it has shifted its focus to accelerating profitable growth. “To support this next chapter, UPS will evolve from an international company into a truly global enterprise through a new operating model designed to better leverage the power of its worldwide network,” the company said in a release. “The new model will enable UPS to serve customers with greater consistency, agility, and scale. It also supports the company's continued evolution from a small package carrier to a provider of integrated logistics solutions.”

As part of that change, the company on Monday announced an array of executive appointments: Nando Cesarone was appointed Executive Vice President and Chief Global Operations Officer; Matt Guffey was appointed Executive Vice President and Chief U.S. Domestic Officer, with responsibility for UPS's U.S. businesses, including Small Package, Roadie, Happy Returns, The UPS Stores, and Mail Innovations. And UPS said it is creating a new role of Executive Vice President and Chief Global Commercial Strategy Officer, responsible for global strategy, marketing and communications, product management, and pricing.

"At UPS, we intend to leverage the full power of our global network," said Tomé. "By combining global standardization with local market responsiveness, we will create greater efficiency, enhance customer experience, and strengthen our ability to grow around the world."

The California artificial intelligence (AI) firm Applied Intuition will team up with the country of Saudi Arabia to deploy in that Middle Eastern nation what they call the “world’s largest autonomous trucking network.”

Sunnyvale, California-based Applied Intuition said it provides physical AI in the automotive, defense, trucking, construction, mining and agriculture industries. Through the new strategic collaboration, the firm will work with Humain, a Riyadh, Saudi Arabia-based artificial intelligence technology and infrastructure provider that is owned by Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund, called the Public Investment Fund (PIF).

In the new deal, Humain and Applied Intuition will build a unified autonomous logistics network at national scale, deploying thousands of autonomous trucks across key Saudi logistics corridors by 2030. The companies said they will focus on autonomous trucking first, laying the foundation for the largest autonomous trucking network in the world, and then expand into logistics, robotaxis, ports, mining, manufacturing, agriculture, construction, and other industries in the future.

The technology foundation for those trucks will be Applied Intuition’s Self-Driving System (SDS), already operating in Level 4 trucks on roads in the U.S., Europe, and Japan. The firm will also provide Vehicle OS software and support vehicle intelligence offerings.

The partners did not indicate which automaker would build the trucks themselves.

“Autonomous trucking will change the economics of moving goods and people,” said Tareq Amin, CEO of HUMAIN. “Our goal with Applied Intuition is to make this region the first to deploy autonomous trucking at scale. Thousands of autonomous trucks operating around the clock can transform the speed, cost, and capacity of our logistics network, with a multiplier effect across economies. We have an opportunity to set a global benchmark for autonomous freight.”

The U.S. robotics market serving packaging and processing was worth more than $440 million in 2025 and is projected to nearly double in the next five years, reaching approximately $800 million by 2031 and representing a 10.3% compound annual growth rate, a report says.

That forecast comes from a study produced by PMMI, The Association for Packaging and Processing Technologies, and by market intelligence firm Interact Analysis.

The bulk of that fast growth will be generated by mobile robots, researchers said. Industrial robots represented 63% of the market in 2025, followed by mobile robots at 32% and collaborative robots at 5%. By 2031, mobile robots are forecast to become the largest segment, reaching a 45% market share. The report also anticipates that humanoid robots, currently a small and largely pilot-stage segment, will grow from 0.1% to 5% of the market by 2031.

“Robotics adoption is moving from targeted applications toward a broader role in packaging and processing operations,” says Jorge Izquierdo, vice president, market development, PMMI. “The research shows that end users are looking beyond labor availability alone. They are prioritizing measurable gains in throughput, cost, quality, and consistency — and they expect reliable systems, strong service, and a clear path to ROI.”

Market optimism for the technology is high. Among end users surveyed, 72% currently use robotics; that figure is expected to climb to 95% by 2031. Sixty-one percent expect to increase robotics investment over the next year. Momentum is similarly strong among OEMs and integrators: 69% currently include robotics in their portfolios, 86% expect to do so by 2031, and 81% anticipate increasing investment over the next year.

The top three drivers of robot adoption by end users are: increasing throughput and productivity, reducing costs, and improving quality and consistency. But the report also identified three persistent hurdles: high upfront cost, integration with existing equipment and systems, and maintenance and service support concerns.

The mega-retailer Walmart plans to build a 1.5 million-square-foot “next-generation fulfillment center” in rural Georgia, saying the site will expand same-day and next-day shipping capabilities across the United States.

Construction is expected to begin in late 2026 on the automated facility, which will be located in Carnesville, a small town in the northeastern part of the state, about halfway between Atlanta, Georgia, and Charlotte, North Carolina.

“As customer expectations continue to evolve, investments like our new fulfillment center in Carnesville help us deliver the speed, convenience, and reliability customers count on,” said Karisa Sprague, Senior Vice President, Supply Chain, Walmart U.S. “We’re excited to join the Carnesville community and create meaningful career opportunities where associates can grow and build their future with Walmart.”

State economic development officials said the project would create 1,000 new jobs and bringing $1.3 billion in investment to Franklin County.

Logistics practitioners have applied internet of things (IoT) technologies to their operations at increasing rates in recent years, seeking to collect new data that could help eliminate blind spots throughout their supply chains. By attaching web-connected sensors to objects, this approach can improve visibility over almost any physical “thing”—items such as inventory, pallets, scanner guns, or lift trucks—and monitor and track a wide range of variables, from location to exposure to light, vibrations, and temperature.

However, as users increasingly monitor those items, many companies face a growing problem—what to do with all the data. Depending on how many “things” are in your IoT and how frequently you collect their status reports, an organization can quickly compile a deep database of digital records. And that presents a challenge: Exactly how do you analyze all those numbers, and how do you act upon the results?

There’s no question that demand for the visibility data generated via IoT tracking is on the rise. For example, demand for one type of IoT technology—radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags—is booming, driven by increasing dependence on real-time information-based asset tracking, along with automated inventory management and supply chain visibility solutions.

That assessment comes from the research and consulting firm Allied Market Research, which says that the global RFID tags market was valued at $5.9 billion in 2022 and is projected to reach $15 billion by 2032, which equates to a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.9%.

One factor behind that surge in the market is the rising use of RFID technology across the retail, health care, logistics, and manufacturing sectors, the firm said in its report, "RFID Tags Market by Type, Frequency, Application: Global Opportunity Analysis and Industry Forecast, 2023–2032."

According to the report, “The major growth drivers for this market include the increase in penetration of IoT, advancement of [real-time location systems], and various government mandates regarding electronic product serialization in pharmaceuticals as well as food safety. This is fueling the convergence of 5G infrastructure and RFID technologies for ultra-fast data capture [and] edge-computing capabilities, thus augmenting the RFID tags market size among data-dense domains.”

So what exactly do companies gain from all that fresh data? Experts say that wins can come easily at first. A white paper from business management and technology solutions provider The DDC Group noted that, “Today’s logistics organizations can observe their operations with a level of granularity that was previously impossible. Shipments are tracked in real time, exceptions are surfaced instantly, and operational dashboards provide continuous updates across global networks.”

However, many organizations are now realizing that simply collecting more data doesn’t necessarily improve their operational performance, DDC said in the paper, “The Visibility Paradox: Why More Data Isn’t Improving Logistics Outcomes.” According to DDC, visibility was once a differentiator between competing logistics businesses but is rapidly becoming simply a baseline capability. Sure, visibility improves the speed and quality of information flow, but it does not inherently improve how that information is interpreted and then translated into action.

The next phase of logistics transformation will not be defined by the ability to see more—many logistics organizations already have the visibility they need. Rather, the opportunity now lies in consistently translating that visibility into better operational outcomes. To bridge that gap, DDC says, it is useful to separate modern logistics operations into three parts: a “Visibility Layer” (what is happening), a “Decision Layer” (what it means), and an “Execution Layer” (what should be done).

​CHOOSE YOUR TOOLS CAREFULLY

As for how companies can make the most of their IoT data, one solution could come from one of the hottest technologies of the moment—artificial intelligence (AI). According to LogiNext, a New Jersey-based specialist in logistics and field service automation, freight transportation fleet operations already generate enormous amounts of telematics and vehicle data every day, but issues such as GPS outages, temperature fluctuations in refrigerated vehicles, and unsafe driving behavior often go unnoticed until they lead to delivery failures, compliance violations, or financial losses. As a solution, the firm says its new Deviation Intelligence platform fills in the gaps by using AI to continuously monitor fleet activity and automatically detect critical exceptions in real time, enabling operations teams to act before disruptions escalate.

Another example of applying AI to the IoT data problem comes from one of the nation’s biggest retailers, Bentonville, Arkansas-based Walmart. In October 2025, the company announced plans for a large-scale deployment of “ambient IoT” technology from IoT tech firm Wiliot. San Diego-based Wiliot said that Walmart would use its tags to track Walmart pallets on an extremely broad scale, immediately integrating millions of the firm’s IoT Pixels, which are battery-free Bluetooth sensors, throughout its supply chain and setting a goal of reaching 90 million by the end of 2026. The solution had already been deployed across 500 Walmart locations by the end of 2025, with plans for national expansion this year. The rollout will ultimately cover 4,600 Walmart Supercenters and Neighborhood Markets, and over 40 distribution centers, generating high-resolution supply chain data that feeds into Walmart’s AI systems.

And that’s where Walmart’s own AI enters the picture. Walmart said its artificial intelligence will generate real-time insights into inventory management, empowering the omnichannel giant to know exactly what merchandise is owned and where it is at any moment. In turn, that could enhance supply chain efficiency, inventory accuracy, and cold chain compliance, the company said in a statement.

​SET YOUR LIMITS

Another way to cut through the data confusion is to set rules and limits before collecting the visibility data itself, so that unacceptable results are instantly flagged for corrective action. That’s the approach taken by lift truck manufacturer The Raymond Corp., which says its iWarehouse Real-Time Location System (iW.RTLS) tracks and controls the movements of lift trucks throughout a logistics facility. The Raymond platform enables facility-defined operational rules to be tied to physical locations throughout the warehouse by using customizable preset zone types. By setting limits on variables like location tracking, geofencing, and zoning, the system enables proactive, rule-driven control, the company says.

Yet another option for monitoring and responding to the flood of IoT data is to work with a third-party partner or vendor. That is the approach offered by Konecranes, a Finnish maker of some of the logistics world’s largest tools: the container-handling cranes that loom over maritime ports and vessels.

Konecranes provides predictive maintenance services for its products, including mobile harbor cranes (MHCs) and, more recently, rubber-tired gantry cranes (RTGs) and rail-mounted gantry cranes (RMGs). Each of those towering machines collects IoT data through vibration sensors installed on critical rotating components, including hoist and trolley motors, gearboxes, and bearings.

To help customers avoid equipment failures that could lead to costly downtime, Konecranes says it analyzes the operating data it collects and communicates the findings to users through an online customer portal. The stakes are high, but according to Konecranes, its strategy of “exception reporting” enables maintenance teams to focus on targeted interventions, helping to reduce downtime and improve spare-parts planning. And those are critical metrics for meeting the intense pressure on ports to process imports and exports swiftly.

“The expansion of our predictive services [offering] to Konecranes RTGs and RMGs is part of a broader strategy to strengthen our digital and lifecycle services for customers worldwide,” said Nico Zamzow, Konecranes’ senior vice president, port services, in a press release. “By combining technology, data analysis, and equipment expertise, we enable terminal operators to act earlier and get even better performance from their Konecranes equipment.”

All these options show that there is no single answer to the question of how companies can make the best use of their IoT data. The best approach will vary for each company, depending on its own information technology (IT) resources, its data analytics budget, its comfort level with operating AI platforms, and its need for real-time feedback.

But the variety of strategies available proves that companies throughout the logistics sector are trying out different tools as they try to capture the potential gains of business improvements fueled by the IoT data boom.

The Port of Los Angles has approved a 30-year lease with Yusen Terminals, securing the longtime marine terminal operator through 2056 and paving the way for an additional $200 million investment in zero-emission cargo-handling equipment.

Yusen Terminals has operated at the Port of Los Angeles since 1991. Spanning 232 acres at Berths 212-224, it is located north of the Vincent Thomas Bridge along the Port’s East Basin Channel. The business is owned by Ocean Network Express (ONE), the Japanese container transportation and shipping company. Yusen’s services at the Port of Los Angeles include stevedoring, terminal operations, and specialized cargo-handling.

Under the approved lease extension, Yusen Terminals will invest an additional $200 million in zero-emission equipment over the coming years. The terminal has been actively transitioning its equipment toward zero-emission operations and currently operates a range of zero-emission and hydrogen fuel-cell equipment, including electric top handlers, forklifts, and yard tractors.

“We’re proud of the operation we’ve built at the Port of Los Angeles and excited about what lies ahead,” said Yusen Terminals President and CEO Alan McCorkle. “This agreement gives us the long-term certainty to continue investing in our terminal, our people and new technology while providing the reliable service our customers expect. We look forward to building on our partnership with the Port for decades to come.”

In a bid to accommodate larger containerships, South Carolina Ports has announced a plan with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to investigate dredging additional depth at North Charleston Terminal, which is currently maintained at 48 feet.

Charleston Harbor was successfully deepened in 2022 to 52 feet — including up to SC Ports’ Wando and Leatherman Terminals — to accommodate two-way traffic and vessels sailing at any tide. Adding additional depth to this stretch of the Cooper River — between Leatherman and North Charleston Terminals — will complete the deepening project for the Port of Charleston.

At that 52-foot depth, Charleston Harbor already has the deepest harbor in the Southeast, but the deepening of that additional stretch would enable all SC Ports’ container terminals to handle the biggest ship at any tide, further enhancing port competitiveness.

Today’s agreement to launch a feasibility study for the plan marks the first step in that project, port leaders said. “Deepening this final stretch makes our port more competitive and supports our long-term plan to modernize and enhance North Charleston Terminal,” SC Ports President and CEO Micah Mallace said. “Having the deepest harbor in the Southeast ensures expedited logistics for port customers and enhances South Carolina’s competitiveness, helping to drive cargo growth and create jobs.”