The Need: An On-Demand Shipment-Locating Service to Prevent Theft and Fraud
CEAT Limited is a leader in the tire industry, with annual revenue exceeding $1 billion. Working with 8-10 third-party logistics partners, they receive more than 200 shipments of rubber a month — all via 3rd-party vehicles.
For domestic shipments, CEAT needed a way to reduce pilferage of raw materials, including entire truckloads of rubber. In addition to the loss of valuable materials, they faced rising insurance premiums for shipments. For imported shipments, they wanted to manage rental costs, driven up by third-party delays in returning leased import containers.
CEAT had tried using GPS vehicle trackers on trucks and RFID tags on shipments, but these had not met their requirements. They turned to Roambee for shipment monitoring services that could provide real-time data on shipments transported by market vehicles and pattern analysis of that data so theft and costly delays could be reduced.
The Solution: Real-Time Intelligence and a "Pay-As-You-Go" Model
Roambee provided CEAT with wireless, portable tracking devices ("Bees") to be attached at the starting point of each shipment. On delivery, the devices were unloaded along with the goods and couriered back to Roambee.
Roambee's cloud-based app provides CEAT with real-time data about each shipment and sends alerts in case of route deviations, unexpected stops, or delays. An audit trail is generated at the end of every shipment to be filed with that order for reference.
Results:
- Pilferage fell to zero.
- The company saw a drastic reduction in late fees for leased containers.
- These improvements made it possible to negotiate for better insurance premiums.
- Real-time alerts allowed CEAT to quickly correct route deviations, speeding up its entire supply chain.
Roambee's portable vehicle traceability solution enabled CEAT to manage and secure shipments, even when they are using leased vehicles. This is another example of how Roambee's next-generation technology and pay-as-you-go business model make shipment monitoring scalable, affordable and controllable.
