Eurosender and the University of Luxembourg’s Interdisciplinary Centre for Security, Reliability and Trust (SnT) have entered into a partnership to help address the challenges of the logistics services industry with artificial intelligence (AI). The project investigates how recent advances in AI can support the matching of supply and demand of transport vans. It aims to achieve this by providing incentives to participants and supporting new pricing strategies. Ultimately, automating the van industry and streamlining operations will improve efficiency and reduce costs.
AI is playing a growing role in many aspects of our lives, and is expected to continue doing so in the near future. In the consumer sector, AI is enabling the creation of new tools that can automate repetitive or tedious tasks, freeing up time for more important or creative work. In the transport sector, AI is helping make travel more efficient and environmentally friendly by optimising routes and reducing carbon emissions.
“AI has a big impact on logistics processes and logistics optimisation,” said Daniil Popov, head of IT at Eurosender. “We see a big potential in automating and digitalising the van industry. But one of the missing parts was how to connect clients with the right vendors without any human intervention.”
In the project, AI will be used to optimise shipping and transport by identifying the most efficient way to route goods, as well as determining the best pricing for logistics services based on real-time data. These benefits can be especially important for the sustainability of transport, helping reduce waste and minimising the carbon footprint of the logistics industry.
“We are excited to work with Eurosender in this field of research because their business model, the operation of a logistics platform, is a use case that will open new doors for our research. Joining forces with Eurosender allows us to address multiple challenges in logistics and develop a state-of-the-art AI solution for this domain. The smart bidding platform that we are set to develop with them shall process data in real time to compute prices,” explained Prof. Radu State, head of the SErvices and Data mANagement (SEDAN) research group at SnT and principal investigator of the project.
“One of the key challenges in the industry is traffic congestion and route optimisation, as well as inventory management and keeping up with customer demands,” said Popov. To help address these challenges, AI algorithms can analyse historical delivery data to determine the optimal route for a given delivery, taking into account factors such as traffic, road conditions, and delivery times. This can help reduce delivery times, fuel consumption, and ultimately lead to lower costs and improved customer satisfaction.
As part of SnT Partnership Programme, a developed prototype will be tested in an operational environment at Eurosender’s premises. This approach favours iteration, allowing teams to quickly spot and overcome obstacles to reach full operational capabilities before the end of the project.