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US 11,455,594 B2Granted
Load tracking computing platform and user interface
AssigneeTarget Brands, Inc.
InventorsEric Christopher Helvie, Adam Lee Hollenbeck, Justine Rockers, Thomas Young
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
The systems and methods described herein relate to managing transportation of loads of items within a retail supply chain. A unified load tracking system aggregates information from multiple supply chain computing systems for presentation on a user interface accessible by multiple users. One user interface provide access to a multitude of information that is interconnected by a common, unique identifier for each movement of a load between an origin and destination. A load board is also provided which automates the spot market auction process and load tender process between carriers and a retail enterprise transportation management system.
Claims19
A computing system for tracking freight movements within a retail supply chain, the computing system comprising:
- at least one processor;
- a memory storing instruction which, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the computing system to:
- publish an edge layer application programming interface (API) configured to aggregate and correlate load tracking data from a plurality of separate, heterogeneous supply chain management computing systems, the load tracking data comprising data for virtual planned movements of items and actual physical movements of items among different locations within the retail supply chain;
- generate a user interface configured to communicate visual representations of the load tracking data to a plurality of computing devices for display on a unified user interface, the plurality of computing devices comprising at least a retailer computing device and a plurality of carrier computing devices;
- operate a load board tool to:
- automatically identify eligible loads for spot market auction, taking into account agreements between a retailer of the retail supply chain and contracted carriers, wherein at least one eligible load is automatically identified for the spot market auction based on an expected auction price of the at least one eligible load being less than a contracted rate between the retailer and a carrier contracted for the at least one eligible load;
- send information about the eligible loads to a virtual board accessible by the plurality of carrier computing devices;
- receive one or more bids from one or more of the plurality of carrier computing devices for the spot market auction;
- automatically determine winning bids for the spot market auction based on predefined rules;
- and
- automatically create and send load tenders for the winning bids and the eligible loads;
- and
- operate a load tracking tool to:
- generate visualizations of planned virtual movements and executed physical movements within the retail supply chain based on the aggregated and correlated load tracking data received from the plurality of separate, heterogeneous supply chain management computing systems;
- and
- automatically generate alerts and status events based on updates to the aggregated and correlated load tracking data.
13 more elements
A computer-implemented method of tracking movements of loads of items within a retail supply chain, the method being executed by at least one processor and comprising:
- aggregating and correlating load tracking data received from a plurality of separate, heterogeneous supply chain management computing systems through an edge layer, the load tracking data comprising data for virtual planned movements of items and actual physical movements of items among different locations within the retail supply chain;
- automatically identifying, with a transportation management system, one or more loads of items eligible for spot market auction, taking into account agreements between a retailer of the retail supply chain and contracted carriers, wherein at least one eligible load of the one or more loads is automatically identified for the spot market auction based on an expected auction price of the at least one eligible load being less than a contracted rate between the retailer and a carrier contracted for the at least one eligible load;
- posting information about the one or more loads on the load board, the load board accessible by a plurality of carrier computing devices through an application programming interface (API);
- receiving one or more bids from one or more of the plurality of carrier computing devices in the spot market auction;
- automatically determining winning bids for each of the loads based on predefined rules;
- automatically creating and sending, with the transportation management system, load tenders for the winning bids and corresponding loads to the carrier computing devices associated with the winning bids;
- generating visual representations of virtual movements and physical movements, load statuses, and locations of loads in near real-time, based on the aggregated and correlated load tracking data received from the separate, heterogeneous supply chain management computing systems, the loads including those corresponding to load tenders for winning bids;
- generating status updates and alerts based on the aggregated and correlated load tracking data;
- and
- communicating the visual representations, status updates, and alerts to a plurality of computing devices through a single, unified graphical user interface (GUI) accessible through an application programming interface (API), the plurality of computing devices comprising at least a retailer computing device and a plurality of carrier computing devices.
7 more elements
A computer-implemented method of managing a load board, the method being executed by at least one processor and comprising:
- automatically identifying, with a transportation management system, one or more loads of items eligible for spot market auction, taking into account agreements between a retailer of the retail supply chain and contracted carriers, wherein at least one eligible load of the one or more loads is automatically identified for the spot market auction based on an expected auction price of the at least one eligible load being less than a contracted rate between the retailer and a carrier contracted for the at least one eligible load;
- posting information about the one or more loads on the load board, the load board accessible by a plurality of carrier computing devices through an application programming interface (API);
- receiving one or more bids from one or more of the carrier computing devices in the spot market auction;
- automatically determining winning bids for each of the loads based on predefined rules;
- automatically creating and sending, with the transportation management system, load tenders for the winning bids and corresponding loads to the carrier computing devices associated with the winning bids;
- generating visual representations of virtual movements and physical movements, load statuses, and locations of loads in near real-time, based on aggregated and correlated load tracking data received from separate, heterogeneous supply chain management computing systems, the loads including those corresponding to the load tenders for winning bids;
- and
- communicating the visual representations to one or more of a plurality of computing devices through a single, unified graphical user interface (GUI), the plurality of computing devices comprising at least a retailer computing device and the plurality of carrier computing devices.
5 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.