Sunnyvale, CA April 19, 2002 Savi Technology, a provider of solutions to track supply chain assets in real time, is set to acquire CanTRACK, a two-year-old manufacturer of software for managing and tracking air cargo containers and their contents.
Financial aspects of the agreement were not disclosed.
Savi said that CanTRACK's software, combined with Savi's SmartChain software platform and SmartSeal electronic seals for air cargo unit loading devices (ULDs), will enable air freight carriers, shippers, supply chain asset providers and third-party logistics companies (3PLs) to protect air cargo shipments while improving asset utilization and operational efficiency.
CanTRACK's Web-native software will be incorporated into the Savi Asset Management application alongside existing modules for rail and reusable transportation containers (RTCs), according to Savi, which is also planning configurations for supply chain assets used in intermodal, truck and ocean modes.
The CanTRACK software automatically updates a central data repository with check-out and check-in data, as well as reports on contents, demurrage, storage and repairs. These solutions are intended to address problems associated with keeping track of air cargo ULDs and ensuring the security of their contents.
According to industry figures, there are about 1 million ULDs in use worldwide, costing between $500 to $35,000 each, and major carriers lose an average of 2 percent of the devices annually due to inefficient, paper-based manual procedures and legacy mainframe systems that don't communicate effectively. Further, only 90 percent of ULDs make it to their intended destinations on time, largely because of missed departures due to inefficient management systems, Savi asserted.
"CanTRACK accelerates our capability to offer comprehensive real-time management and security solutions for aviation, which is especially important today because of heightened terrorist concerns," said Blair LaCorte, Savi's executive vice president of marketing and business development. "Combined with Savis' existing SmartSeal and Asset Management System, our customers can now more safely and efficiently utilize ULDs whether they're in-transit, aggregated for storage and maintenance or reallocated for new assignments."
CanTRACK software solutions were designed to link with automated data collection systems such as radio frequency identification (RFID) technologies, optical barcodes and GPS.
For more information on new solutions for wireless asset tracking, see "Needle in a Supply Chain Haystack," the Net Best Thing column in the January 2002 issue of iSource Business (<http://www.isourceonline.com/article.asp?article_id=2155>).
