Logispics Tackling Supply Chain Waste With Trailer Utilization Technology

Taking a closer look at one of the slides on his pitch deck led Brian Augsburger to realize that a thing they thought was a problem, was actually an opportunity.

Augsburger entered the Lumos Accelerator in early September with Logispics – a mobile and web app that allows companies to take a picture of their trailer and the Logispics team will help fix the underutilized space.

One of Augsburger’s slides on his pitch deck outlined this typically underutilized, empty space on a semi trailer in red.

“Semi trucks on the road run at about 64 percent capacity, so there’s a lot of wasted space on average,” he says.

But one day he realized that empty space didn’t have to be the problem, but an opportunity.

“Now we just buy that empty space off companies and resell it,” Augsburger says. “Our mission coming into this was to fill the world’s trailers, and it’s still that, but how we do it has changed a little bit.” 

Logispics coordinates two shippers to fill a trailer to capacity. As Augsburger explains, the primary shipper fills a trailer and the carrier takes a photo of what’s inside. Logispics will use that photo to determine the utilization rate. The startup’s technology then finds a load from a secondary shipper along the driver’s route that will fit in the underutilized space.

“We say it’s a win-win-win,” Augsburger explains. “Shipper one wins because they get money back. Shipper two wins because his shipment gets to his destination faster and cheaper, and then the carrier wins because he’s making an extra stop and he’s going to get paid more.” 

Augsburger and his two fellow co-founders have been chipping away at Logisipics while balancing full-time jobs, but were interested in an accelerator program for the condensed opportunity it offered to really focus on the business.

“Logispics was able to get the time, energy and little bit of capital that it deserved to see if it could become something,” he says. 

While the problem of underutilization certainly exists, Augsburger says they are now investigating the market for their technology.

“Logispics is a brand new idea, there’s nothing out there like it,” he says. “That sounds cool, but it’s hard to prove that out. Do people actually want this thing? Is this a problem that people care about solving?” 

The startup has secured meetings with billion dollar companies like GE, Unilever and John Deere to demo their solution. Logispics aims to secure six companies to sign up for a three month pilot program to audit their facilities and see how much empty space a company has and how much money Logispics could potentially save them through load sharing.

The startup is also actively raising money. The accelerator brought in venture capitalist Paul Singh to round out the 10-week program. Augsburger says the business will be taking feedback from Singh to get in front of many more investors.

For more information, visit logispics.com.