Penang-Venlo demonstration by Seacon Logistics

Living Lab White Paper / May 2014
Penang-Venlo demonstration by Seacon Logistics
“Participation in the Cassandra project meant for Seacon Logistics that we are able
to optimise the visibility and security of Multimodal Intercontinental Trade Lanes
for our Customers” (Johan Vosbeek, Seacon Logistics)
Seacon Logistics is one of four industry partners in the Cassandra project and the leading participant of
the Penang-Venlo trade lane. Seacon Logistics offers its customers complete freight forwarding services
including value added logistics and customs brokerage. Even before the Cassandra project, Seacon Logistics started development of a 4PL control tower solution that improves visibility of supply chain performance for their customers. This solution should lead to improved planning, reducing stock levels in the supply chain as well as the number of airfreight pallets (for high priority goods) and improving supplier performance, etc.
In the Cassandra project, Seacon Logistics’ ambition was to capture digital and high quality data at the
source in order to re-use information, avoid errors from manual data entry and improve visibility on the
shipments and containers. This should also lead to further opportunities for supply chain improvements.
Capturing data from the source is a crucial principle in the Cassandra project. In this demonstration Seacon Logistics collaborates with their customer Océ Technologies. Océ is interested in increased visibility to
improve warehouse operations in Venlo. Especially information on exact container content is important.
The need for high quality data for Seacon Logistics becomes clear from the risk analysis that was performed during the project. Examples of important risks for Seacon Logistics are risks related to business
continuity and customer satisfaction, unexpected delays (e.g. due to transhipments) and use of incorrect
values on declarations. Current practice to mitigate these risks is to continuously check the status of timecritical shipments by phone, track & trace systems of ocean carriers, etc. This is a time consuming activity
and is even more complicated in overseas logistics as time differences, language barriers and cultural
differences affect the effectiveness of communication.
The Cassandra solutions for Seacon Logistics were tested and evaluated in a demonstration trade lane
between Penang (Malaysia) to Venlo (Netherlands). The agent of Seacon Logistics in Malaysia, who coordinates all forwarding activities locally, was also heavily involved. Focusing on capturing data from the
source means that the focus is on the Malaysian side of the trade lane. Therefore, during the design stage,
various stakeholders in the Penang area - consignor, haulier, Penang terminal and ocean carrier agent –
were interviewed and asked for their support for the Cassandra project.
www.cassandra-project.eu
page 1 / 3
Living Lab White Paper / May 2014
Penang-Venlo demonstration by Seacon Logistics
Capturing data at the source in Malaysia
To deliver the visibility and availability of high quality digital information in the supply chain, an easy-touse and easy-to-adopt tool for data capture in Malaysia was needed. The crucial activities in Malaysia
were the activities performed by Seacon’s agent. This agent handles all documentation for the trade lane
and is a central node in communication between all the parties involved locally. The agent in Malaysia had
limited IT support and no dedicated tooling to support his activities when this project started. He relied
heavily on communications by phone, fax and email. The much needed information was therefore not yet
available digitally. In this demonstration the challenge was first to support digitisation of the information
with a data capture tool and then to visualise the information in such a way that it is attractive and understandable for the customers of Seacon Logistics.
Seacon Logistics decided to design the data capture tool so that it is easy-to-use and also supportive for
the agent’s processes. This would encourage the tool’s use without adding any administrative burden and
costs to the chain. Seacon Logistics estimates other agents in their network could benefit from using the
tool as well and decided this would be their primary target group.
The data capture tool developed in the Cassandra project by Seacon Logistics is designed as a workflow
tool in which subsequent steps can be executed by different parties. The workflow starts with a purchase
order step that needs to be completed by the buyer. In this case, purchase order information was provided by Océ Technologies. The following steps then include a shipping instruction from the shipper,
booking of ocean carriage and stuffing. In the final step the export process is completed by adding details
from the export declaration and the master bill of lading.
Figure 1: Building visibility step-by-step in the Seacon workflow tool
www.cassandra-project.eu
page 2 / 3
Living Lab White Paper / May 2014
Penang-Venlo demonstration by Seacon Logistics
Ready for expansion
The data capture tool was used by Seacon’s agent in Malaysia during the trial period. The first evaluation
showed that the tool is user friendly and easy to understand. Hardly any instruction was needed to get
the Malaysian organisation started. Although the tool is now already in use for this trade lane, the functionality and data quality can be further improved by also making it available to, for example, the customs
broker in Malaysia. By doing so, the agent will not only be supported but can even see a decrease in work
load for administrative tasks and focus more on the value added activities they perform.
The data capture tool has shown Seacon Logistics that it can greatly improve their data quality, especially
in timeliness. It can also limit the amount of time spent for entering data in their own systems because
the data can now be interfaced automatically. Because of this, Seacon will continue improving the data
capture tool after the Cassandra project. Enhancements that are envisioned are connections with terminals and/or carriers to capture transport milestones automatically, customisation or configuration of the
tool to specific customer or trade lane needs and integration with the 4PL control tower concept. With
these enhancements, it should be possible to refine the trade lane of Océ Technologies between Penang
and Venlo but also support other supply chains.
Océ Technologies could use the Cassandra solutions to have real-time visibility of the containers that
were approaching their warehouse. The confirmed content of containers helped them improve their inbound process and their planning for further production activities.
Early in the demonstration in the Cassandra project, it was clear that the Seacon Logistics demonstration
holds a strong case for developing a trusted trade lane concept for trade facilitation from Dutch Customs.
Both Seacon Logistics and Dutch Customs therefore decided to join the consortium for the FP7 Core project. In the Core project, the concept of a trusted trade lane, as an extension of the trusted trader concept, will be further researched and if possible implemented.
Contact details
Gé Coenen, Seacon Logistics, Email: [email protected]
Johan Vosbeek, Seacon Logistics, Email: [email protected]
Inge Lucassen , TNO, Email: [email protected]
Further information
www.cassandra-project.eu
www.seaconlogistics.com
www.cassandra-project.eu
page 3 / 3

Download Report