Swift Transportation Grows Revenue from 30,000 Trailers with SkyBitz

Phoenix, Arizona-based Swift Transportation is the largest full-truckload carrier in North America. Swift offers a full line of services to shippers that include linehaul, flatbed, intermodal, refrigerated, dedicated and logistics management.

Challenge

Test and install a 4G-enabled telematics platform before the 3G shutdown

In 2020, Swift Transportation started the process of replacing more than 20,000 soon-to-be outdated trailer tracking units for dry van trailers. Management had less than two years to evaluate, test and install a 4G-enabled telematics platform.

Impact

Accuracy, reliability, and increased detention billing ability

For Swift, the benefits of using the SkyBitz platform to manage nearly 30,000 trailers can be summarized as:

Easy installation: The self-contained, solar-powered SkyBitz device eliminates the need to run wires to the trailer’s 7-way connector, which previously created maintenance issues with trailer tracking systems.

Improved reliability: The company has a 93% working rate for units fleetwide, and SkyBitz promptly replaces units in need of maintenance. Prior to using SkyBitz, Swift’s percentage of non-working trailer tracking units was between 25% and 35%.

Increased revenue: The accuracy and reliability of the SkyBitz solution increased Swift’s detention billing ability. This nearly paid for the system, and revenue also increased from tracking and billing fleets for mileage who share the same customers with Swift and use its trailers.

Higher driver productivity: Instead of sending drivers around yards looking for empty trailers, Swift gives them precise locations of available units to eliminate wasted time, miles, and fuel.

Fast maintenance: Menzildzic uses weekly exception reports from SkyBitz to locate any units that are not working. Alerts are loaded into Swift’s fleet maintenance software to give shop supervisors pop-up reminders to replace non-working units when they arrive at Swift locations.

To carriers looking to install or upgrade a trailer tracking solution, Menzildzic offers this advice:

Impact

Saving 40 hrs of labor a week at approximately $25 per hour

Within the past year, Bennett Family of Companies has reduced costs and improved the utilization of a specialized trailer fleet by:

• Automating yard checks. Previously, the process was done manually and took someone at least an hour each day at Bennett’s nine trailer drop locations. Bennett can save up to nine hours in labor each day with a digital yard check. Eiermann projects that Bennett will soon be saving 40 hours of labor a week at approximately $25 per hour.
• Right-sizing the fleet. Using the reporting tools of the SkyBitz Insight user portal, Bennett is monitoring asset utilization and idle times for trailers and components. Bennett uses this information to identify underutilized assets and move them to locations in need or dispose of them to reduce operating costs and free up capital.
• Establishing a reporting cadence. Bennett uses the SkyBitz Insight portal to monitor key metrics and reports on asset mileage, idle time, and location-based activities. With these reports, the company is benchmarking progress towards goals.

Moving towards smart trailers

Going forward, Eiermann plans to continue using mileage and location data from SkyBitz to monitor equipment usage. The data will provide a better understanding of the fleet’s true cost of operation for each type of asset.

Currently, Bennett is using “billed” miles from its transportation management software (TMS) for analysis but with SkyBitz data will enable capture of non-revenue or “deadhead” miles on equipment to get the true cost per mile to operate each type of asset, he said.

Bennett also sees value in monitoring the status of tire pressures, load distribution and other data points to prevent costly incidents related to heavy and specialized cargo the company transports.

“The biggest thing we want to do is to build smart trailers,” he said. “The last thing we want is to have a tire blow out while hauling 300,000 pounds going 55 mph.”

“Moving towards proactive fleet management is where Bennett will be taking the next step with SkyBitz,” said Eiermann, “and by using the new SkyBitz Kinnect product, we will be able to do that type of monitoring of our assets” he said. “This will help us improve going forward.”