I wrote in June about how there is tremendous interest in transportation procurement tools since companies are looking for the opportunity to reduce costs given the tough ecomomic conditions.  I recently read a report that cites that Transportation Procurement remains hot and shippers are putting more of their freight spend out to bid with the savings averaging 12%. 

Transportation procurement does not require a large software investment and can be ideally managed with a software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution that automates and standardizes the procurement process. Companies generally utilize a transportation procurement tool at a tactical level where the focus is on a select number of lanes instead the entire network.  There are a number of SaaS vendors in the marketplace including i2, JDA, LeanLogistics, Manhattan Associates and MercuryGate. 

Transportation Management Systems (TMS) enable the collaborative sharing of data throughout organizations and often lead to more informed decision making.  In this video of Beth Enslow, senior vice president for supply chain risk at Marsh Inc.discusses the collaboration within organizations and why eight out of nine TMS users are now outside the transportation department.  Here is the link to the complete video (supplychainbrain.com registration required):

http://newsletters.supplychainbrain.com//lt.php?id=KUoLBgQLUwECAUVfDFdOUAdTAVA%3D