Unveiling the Future of Logistics: TLIP and Airflo Unite to Optimise Digital Supply Chain Management
TL;DR
TLIP and Airflo Ltd. have formed a transformative partnership, integrating TLIP with Airflo’s CargoWise system. This integration facilitates the exchange of critical consignment data, streamlining tracking, documentation sharing, and planning in the digital supply chain.
The TLIP team is excited to announce a groundbreaking partnership with Airflo Ltd., a leader in freight forwarding within the supply chain industry. This collaboration marks a significant milestone in our journey towards digital trade facilitation.
In this post, we’ll delve into the origin of this partnership, explore the challenges that inspired our collaboration, and reveal how our joint efforts have led to a transformative integration that promises to reshape the digital supply chain landscape.
Sharing critical data
By integrating TLIP with Airflo’s CargoWise’s integrated and highly modular logistics software, we’ve established a seamless connection for sharing critical consignment data between our platforms.
CargoWise is a cloud-based software platform widely used by logistics companies to streamline logistics operations, empowering users to efficiently handle intricate logistics transactions and oversee operations from a single database, irrespective of the number of users, functions, offices, or countries involved.
The consignment data that can now be shared between TLIP and Airflo with the new CargoWise integration includes the following government documents:
This integration sets the stage for enhanced efficiency, transparency, and collaboration across the supply chain.
Benefits of the integration
Airflo will receive untampered export documents from the involved government agencies directly to CargoWise, their internal Enterprise Resource Platform (ERP), making it easier to:
● Track their consignment’s progress through government statuses i.e., inspection and clearance from the involved government agencies, which alleviates the traders and freight forwarders from moving around to check the statuses and collect the physical documents from the relevant agencies.
● Share the consignment’s progress and documentation with the relevant partners, especially the owners (exporter/importer) of the consignment as it moves through the various steps.
● Share the consignment documents with their counterparts in the importing country for better planning, risk management, and faster pre-clearance.
Speaking on the announcement of the collaboration, Samwel Kewndo, Service Quality Lead, Documentation at Airflo, said:
“At Airflo Ltd, digitisation and process improvement are currently key areas that we’re targeting towards revolutionising the way we work. Our collaboration on the TLIP initiative is something we believe comes at the best moment and is very pivotal in our digitalisation journey. With TLIP, we expect to reduce document processing times through automation, increase data accuracy in our system through integration, and reduce paperwork that will eliminate document losses and claims. To our Customers, we expect TLIP to make information readily available to them and therefore improve transparency, reduce wait times, and email traffic.”
Challenges faced in the integration
Both the TLIP team and the Airflo team came across challenges while working to make the integration process a success:
Challenge 1: Divergent Document Identifiers
One of the initial hurdles we encountered revolved around the use of disparate identifiers for documents within the systems. For instance, while the Export Declaration relied on the Entry number, the House Airway Bill employed the S-number or Waybill number, along with other identifiers like the Phyto and commercial invoice numbers. TLIP uses the UCR number as its main consignment identifier but allowed the ability to link many identifiers to the consignment to allow Airflo to access the consignment with their chosen identifier.
Challenge 2: Limited Adaptation for Digital Trade Documents
As important as the digital versions of government documents are, physical documents are still required by the importing countries for clearance. To address this issue, TLIP is working with government partner agencies and governments to drive the adaptation of digital data in place of physical documents. Additionally, to ensure compliance while mitigating delays, TLIP facilitated the sharing of scanned versions of documents with relevant stakeholders. This measure served as a temporary solution, bridging the gap between digital innovation and regulatory requirements.
Key takeaways
● TLIP and Airflo have partnered to drive digital innovation by enhancing the sharing of digital trade documents.
● An integration between the TLIP system and Airflo CargoWise system has been completed and will focus on sharing the Export Declaration, PhytoSanitary Certificate, Certificate of Origin, and House AirwayBill.
● The benefits of this integration will include easier sharing of the data with involved parties, better planning and risk management, and easier tracking.
● The two main challenges were the lack of a uniform/common identifier between the agencies and the slow adoption of digital trade documents.
Acknowledgments
In conclusion, this is a giant leap for easier trade facilitation through digital connection and we’re very grateful to Airflo for their collaboration and continued support. We also express appreciation to Trademark Africa for their financial support and pivotal role in fostering collaboration and partnership. Additionally, we acknowledge the remarkable efforts of the IOTA Foundation in developing, integrating, and maintaining the technology behind TLIP.
Stay connected with us through our blog, LinkedIn, and Twitter pages to remain updated on our ongoing mission to streamline system integration in international trade. Together, we strive to eliminate friction and optimise trade opportunities for all stakeholders. Join us as we continue to innovate and drive positive change in the industry.
