Trucker Tools
Smartphone 'Apps' Revolutionizing Freight Matching

Modern-day logistics is transforming to match the speed of the digital world; however, the freight matching business is yet to completely explore the potential of modern mobility and technology-driven logistics. A significant part of this complex structure of the industry is attributed to the daunting procedures for finding capacity and booking freight loads traditionally followed by both the brokers and carriers. The brokers need to carry out a comprehensive process of qualifying, selecting, and calling specific carriers to match the load with. This more often than not results in a mismatch due to the unavailability of the selected load carriers leading to an impending capacity crunch. Furthermore, the communication gap between the stakeholders adds to inefficiency and wasted time with conventional load matching practices. After witnessing these inefficient models confining the potential of freight matching business, Prasad Gollapalli decided to simplify the match between carriers with available vehicles and brokers seeking load carriers. This marked the foundation of Trucker Tools that bridges the gap between brokers and carriers through its Smart Capacity app—a next-generation freight matching and carrier connectivity platform.

Launched in 2017, Smart Capacity is the brainchild of Prasad Gollapalli, founder and CEO of Trucker Tools, who ventured into the freight matching space with a strong zeal to build a solution that would support a trusted and reliably-connected carrier network while providing features and functions to improve capacity management. Smart Capacity not only establishes real-time communication between the brokerage and carrier entities but also enables them with real-time visibility throughout their engagement. Gollapalli says, “The Smart Capacity platform leapfrogs current freight matching technology, freight marketplaces, and companies who are trying to disintermediate or “uberize” the transportation industry.”

Built around a community of small carriers, operators, and owners, Smart Capacity is designed to identify available truck capacities in real time and match them with available loads. The platform tracks and recommends optimal trucks for brokers’ loads throughout a network comprised of 3PL/broker partners and carriers in real time.

The Smart Capacity platform leapfrogs current freight matching technology, freight marketplaces and companies who are trying to disintermediate or “uberize” the transportation industry

The app then aggregates that information and matches it with available loads while streamlining the entire process in a private and protected environment.

Establishing a strong stature in the driver community with Smart Capacity, Trucker tools has garnered tremendous traction predominantly among owner-operators and small carriers who account for nearly half a million downloads of the free Trucker Tools app. “Every button on our app is powered by the feedback and the discussion we have with our customers, both on the carrier and broker front. It gives us an insight into customer’s app usage and how to enhance its features and functionalities to address specific customer needs,” adds Gollapalli.

Before developing Smart Capacity, Trucker Tools introduced the ‘Load Track’, a tool for tracking the load status from pickup point to the delivery destination. Looking back at the tremendous adoption of Smart Capacity and Load Track by a huge segment of customers, Gollapalli outlines the great potential of combining the two tools that will revolutionize the mainstream freight management industry.

According to Gollapalli, many entities are entering the market to disrupt the broker business, alongside brokers who are building their own apps and introducing mobility applications. Gollapalli emphasizes that while a technology provider like Trucker Tools is disrupting the market, what it's really doing is streamlining and simplifying the relationship between the broker and carrier. "We are enabling the broker community with superior technology, not disintermediating it." Trucker Tools is an example of how technology can create a new ecosystem that benefits all players through a collaborative network that powers the freight matching landscape.

“We have been fortunate enough to start off on the right foot on both the broker and the carrier sides in pursuit of creating a strong opportunity for us to prosper in the freight management space,” concludes Gollapalli.