LoadProof Video Testimonial – Kristi

Hello everyone, welcome to Talking Logistics
where we have conversations with thought leaders and newsmakers in the supply chain logistics industry. It’s my great pleasure to welcome today’s program: Christy Montgomery, VP of Kenco Innovation Labs, and Puga Sankara, co-founder of Smart Gladiator. Today we’re going to talk about collaborative supply chain innovation, a new model for success.

In supply chain logistics, there’s always a new problem to solve or a new opportunity to pursue, often requiring some form of innovation—whether it’s process innovation, technology innovation, or both. There are many different paths companies can take to drive supply chain innovation, but today we’re focusing on a collaborative approach between logistics service providers and technology companies. It’s great to have both Christy and Puga here today to share their experiences and approaches to solving real business problems that many supply chain logistics executives can relate to. So, Christy and Puga, welcome to the program!

Thank you, Adrian. It’s great to be here.
Thank you very much for the opportunity. It’s a pleasure to be here.

Great! Now, Christy, welcome back to the program. You’ve been here before, and I believe it’s been about a year since you last discussed the Internet of Things. It might be even longer since Kenco Innovation Labs was launched. Given your role and experience to date, what have been some lessons learned in driving supply chain innovation?

We’ve learned a lot in the last 18 months to two years of having this dedicated focus on innovation here at Kenco. One key learning is that while everyone is interested in innovation, they don’t necessarily know how to describe it; they know it when they see it. Our customers are responding positively. A recent survey from Supply Chain Digest indicated that 71 percent of shippers want 3PLs to provide innovation, which shows wide acceptance in the industry.

Another lesson is that supply chain is a constant cost-pressure business. Finding ways to innovate successfully in a lean startup model and rapid development cycle, as well as collaborating openly with others, is vital. The concept of open innovation that Henry Chesbrough introduced in the early 2000s is particularly relevant for us. It’s about collaborating with customers, suppliers, and partners like Puga and Smart Gladiator to bring innovation into the supply chain. No one expert has all the answers; we all come together as a team to develop solutions that will change the future of the supply chain.

I concur with a lot of what you said. Innovation is a broadly tossed word that gets used a lot, particularly by analysts like myself. However, what exactly does it mean? The consistent feedback I hear from technology companies, manufacturers, and retailers is that whatever innovation means to them, it must be done much more quickly and cost-effectively than in the past. The days of taking 18 months to two years for a project are over; by then, you might be out of business.

Now, Puga, you’re new to the program. Welcome! I like to get a background on how people get involved in supply chain logistics. Could you briefly tell us about your career path, how you got involved in supply chain logistics, and what your current role and responsibilities are at Smart Gladiator?

Sure! I graduated as a mechanical engineer, always having an affinity for the factory floor. I worked in India for a couple of years. Although I was a mechanical engineer, I got hired into computers due to the Y2K boom. You might know the story of Manhattan Associates. I joined them in India shortly after they went public in 1998. I had a great experience working there, learning all about WMS and being on-site for deployments. Eventually, I became a design architect and project manager.

I then pursued an MBA at Georgia Tech. After 2007, with advancements in mobile tech, we noticed a gap between consumer-side technology and what was happening in enterprise. We created a simple prototype, received positive feedback, and decided to move forward. Now we have a solid customer base and are working on unique projects.

At Smart Gladiator, I lead deployments, sales, and product roadmap. We also have a development center in India where our talented developers quickly build capabilities. We’re focused on bringing new capabilities to the industry.

That’s an impressive career path! As an engineer myself, I started my career on the factory floor as well. It’s interesting how many engineers end up in supply chain logistics these days. Let’s discuss mobile technologies, which are your focus today. How would you characterize the current state of mobile enablement in supply chain management? What opportunities and roadblocks still exist?

There are many opportunities. In our personal lives, we’ve changed dramatically; we’re constantly communicating, sharing videos, and interacting online. These capabilities can enhance collaboration and data collection in supply chain management.

Three main trends are impacting the industry: the pace of technology is accelerating, and we’re at a defining moment. For example, many retailers are shutting down as consumers prefer online shopping, and everything is becoming smart and connected. There’s a huge opportunity to make supply chains more effective and collaborative.

However, there are roadblocks. Change management is a big issue in supply chain because many people are resistant to change. Supply chain professionals are generally risk-averse; they don’t want to ship items only to face problems due to outdated processes. While these challenges exist, the accelerated pace of change means we’ll increasingly see individuals inclined to embrace innovation and adapt to new capabilities. The mindset around risk will evolve as we move forward.

Yeah, no I think you know that that’s always the common thread is change management, right? People being too risk averse, thinking perhaps, “Hey, things seem to be working okay, why do we need to change?” It’s not until they’re fully behind the curve that they realize maybe they should have made that change a year or two ago, instead of now being behind the curve. I certainly see that with technology today; things like bring your own devices in the mobile arena were met with a lot of resistance five, six, seven, eight years ago. Now, many IT organizations are embracing it, and that obviously plays a role on the technology front, particularly with mobile.

Well, Christy, let’s go back to you and talk about the opportunity that brought you and Pogo together, starting from the very beginning. What was the business problem that you were trying to solve? We in the innovation lab focus a lot on customer problems. We often say that we are not solutions in search of a problem; we’re looking at the problem first. A customer approached us who was struggling with a high percentage of complaints around shipments and retail compliance fines related to product delivery.

The retailer claimed there was a shortage in shipments, the product arrived damaged, or the labels weren’t placed correctly. There are significant rules in the industry now around retail compliance, and retailers generate up to 13% of their revenue on chargebacks alone. This becomes a broader problem for our industry. This particular customer was struggling with the manual way they captured proof that they did things right. They were using manual checklists and digital cameras, but the organization of that data was chaotic.

Three months later, when a customer asked them to prove they shipped correctly, they had an overwhelming amount of data to sift through with no relevant search capabilities. We started doing research to see if any solutions existed in our innovation lab but didn’t find anything. We threw together a quick Android prototype to test the concept, piloted it at five sites for about three months, and it was wildly successful. We had people begging us for the prototype, but we knew that wasn’t the answer, so we sought external help.

You mentioned the build versus buy decision, which is particularly relevant for logistics service providers. It sounds like you ended up prototyping your own solution but found shortcomings. This led to a third path. If you had to characterize the factors that led you there, what were some key elements? Part of it was that our innovation lab is small and lacks developers. While Kenco has significant IT talent, they also have a strategic roadmap and obligations. Since we couldn’t build it internally, we began searching for external partners.

Kenco isn’t in the software development business; we focus on supply chain and logistics services. As we looked at larger partners, we found it took them a long time to change and add to their portfolio. We realized we’d be looking at a couple of years to get a product to market. In the meantime, we began working with accelerators and startups, and that’s when we came across Pogo. Their tagline, “mobile enabling the supply chain,” fit perfectly with our vision for the product.

Great! That underscores the speed of innovation, which is critical today. Pogo, the end result of the collaboration between your teams was a mobile app called Load Proof. Can you describe the development process? How did the two companies work together, and how long did it take from concept to a working solution? Absolutely! When we first met, it was a meeting of minds. We both wanted to address the same problem. We had a primitive version of a similar solution deployed at a customer site. The idea was to help digitize returns paperwork and streamline documentation.

Once we validated the concept, we expanded it and put it in the cloud. The solution became a sleek plug-and-play application where users could take pictures and upload them directly. This approach aimed to “image-enable” the entire supply chain, making it easy to track shipments and view their statuses by load number or PO number. There was no debate about the value of this solution. We were quickly on board, and the entire development took about four months, thanks to the existing groundwork and a dedicated development team.

Christy, in terms of developing the solution and requirements, were your associates involved in the process? How much feedback was there between Kenco and the associates who would be using the solution? Absolutely, we started with a focus group to define how the solution should work for success. This involved a couple of days of calls since we’re geographically dispersed. We then had a working session to map out the requirements, and Smart Gladiator took that initial product and developed it.

We then tested it at five to six sites that were part of the focus group to gather feedback.

Test that for us before it went live on the market. It was in a test environment, and Poga and his team released it to these sites. Then we had weekly update calls with the team to say, “Okay, what are you seeing? What can we do better?” Are there failures in how we put it together? Did we not think about this correctly? The Kenko associates on the floor were heavily involved in not only the upfront design but testing it along the way and providing feedback to both of our teams to say, “Here’s how we need to rethink this.”

Great. Let’s go back to the business problem you talked about. The chargebacks and the challenges historically associated with that. How has this new app addressed that problem? What have been some of the benefits achieved to date? The original customer that came to us with the problem has seen a 95% reduction in customer complaints based on their usage of Woodproof. We had another customer who avoided about ten thousand dollars in fines, and keep in mind it’s only been out there about three months. Another customer finds it enormously valuable in proving that their international shipments were handled properly.

They are finding a lot of shifting as the containers are moving overseas. Being able to show that it was loaded properly in the container has really helped their relationship with end clients overseas. I could give you example after example, but enormous success so far, and we are onboarding new customers every week.

Those are some significant benefits, particularly in the relatively short timeframe. Christian, maybe Poga, you can add your thoughts as well. For clarification, is this Load Proof app available to other companies, or is it a proprietary solution just for Kenko and its customers? How does this partnership work moving forward? Adrian saw this as a much broader supply chain problem. Our goal with our innovation lab is not to solely focus on our own internal needs.

To be honest, we have a lot of customers who have other providers in their network. Offering them the solution in our one facility didn’t actually benefit them overall. One of the great things that the Smart Gladiator partnership brought is that it’s not a proprietary solution. I’ll let Poga speak a bit to the availability of it, but no, it’s not proprietary.

Yes, absolutely. It’s all about the spirit of the partnership. Part of that spirit is bringing innovation to the supply chain marketplace. It’s not proprietary; we are onboarding other customers outside of the incumbent. People are seeing benefits and interpreting it in different ways. For example, we could deploy mobile consumer devices in a warehouse environment. If someone wants to see a picture of the product, Load Proof could be a perfect repository for all those images.

It’s a very generic tool that can be applied anywhere. For example, if we want to show images during picking or banking, we can incorporate Load Proof. The reason we were able to do it quickly is that it could be used for anything where we have to image-enable something.

You touched upon an interesting aspect of innovation. Increasing the velocity of innovation means not getting caught up in adding unnecessary features. If you don’t need an extra button, don’t put it there. It’s the same today with software; trying to perfect something can overcomplicate it and extend the time needed for launch. Both of you focused on a specific need and defined it well, which allowed for a quick rollout.

As a way to wrap up, what do you think are the key ingredients for success? I think the spirit of the partnership is crucial. From Kenko’s perspective, they were clearly on board and knowledgeable about the methodology for working with a startup. There was transparency in our conversations, and meeting face-to-face made things easier. The initial fit was well-formed, and that’s the reason for our success.

Absolutely. Shared vision is important. Beyond that, Poga and his team had a vision that extended beyond what we initially thought for the product. We’re finding uses in real estate; for example, customers are using it to capture what a building looked like when they moved in, avoiding leasehold costs. This is a tribute to Poga’s team thinking outside the box about the application.

In addition to shared vision, being open to a new business model is essential. This partnership required us to create a new services agreement and work together differently than we would have originally. Being synchronized in our marketing efforts around the Load Proof tool has also been wildly successful. Understanding the limitations of working with a startup has made us successful in this collaboration.

Great insights from both of you. Alignment in vision and strategy, ongoing communication, and a willingness to adapt in forming a partnership have been key. Thank you both for sharing your story and experience on driving supply chain innovation through collaboration.

Thank you very much for the opportunity. And thank you to everyone who joined us today. If you’re watching this on demand and have questions for Christy or Poga, feel free to post them. We look forward to seeing you in a future episode of Talking Logistics. Have a great day!