How strong is the digital traction in container shipping? In a word: Very.

As the digital transformation in container shipping continues to gather pace, it is worthwhile to contemplate just how much actual traction the new tools and platforms are gaining. For any early start-up is it comparatively easy to post extremely high growth rates – after all growing from 2 TEU to 10 TEU is a growth rate of 400%.

To gauge whether there is genuinely strong traction, it is the absolute number of transactions which is the more important number. An example of this is 300Cubits which halted operations last week stating that only a couple hundred containers had gone through their system.

Usually most of the freight tools/platforms do not publish such numbers, however for the purpose of this update, I have been able to obtain numbers from some of the more prominent platforms in this respect.

First off, it is important to note that these tools and platforms are not offering the exact same products and services, and hence comparing their performance stats directly is not meaningful and is not the purpose of this update – the purpose is to demonstrate that the industry is indeed beyond small-time experiments, and on the path to make digital models the norm.

And, now, onto the actual numbers.

Hapag-Lloyd publicly stated in their annual report for 2018 that in Q4 a full 6% of their volume was booked through their online platform Quick Quotes. When asked about the latest numbers last Friday, the reply from Hapag Lloyd was that they are now having a weekly run rate regularly over 9% of the weekly volume. If I look at their published volumes for Q2 2019, this would equate to 21.000 TEU weekly – and seen over a full year this would amount to approximately 1 million TEU. Furthermore, in the 2018 report they stated the target was to reach 15% of the volume by 2023 which I would estimate to equate roughly 2 million TEU at the time.

Kontainers, which provide own branded platforms for carriers and forwarders to shift to online sales of shipping, is reporting 320.000 bookings through their systems in 2018, 486.000 Year-to-Date in 2019, on track for 710.000 bookings in full year 2019, and expected to exceed 1 million bookings in 2020.

NYSHEX which focuses on enforceable contracts, reports 19.000 TEU in 2018, on track for 82.000 TEU in 2019 and forecasting 428.000 TEU in 2020.

Cogoport, which is an online freight platform, reports that in the past 2 years up to December 2019 (including expectations for rest of 2019) they have seen in excess of 250.000 containers booked, equating more than 300.000 TEU.

Some of the other well-known platforms are not as forthcoming in disclosing their absolute volumes as of yet.

Flexport only wants to inform that their total revenue in 2018 was 414 Million USD, but this is not split between Ocean and Air services. They are not disclosing container volumes, but analyst estimates from earlier in 2019 indicate volumes in the range of 80.000 TEU for US imports in full year 2018 with indications from Flexport back in 2018 hinting at over 100.000 TEU for full year 2018. The accurate number is not disclosed.

For the purpose of this article, FreightOS and iContainers have politely declined to provide absolute numbers for different reasons.

Whilst there is no claim that this view at digital traction is comprehensive across all players in the field – it is clearly not – it does show that some of the players are not to be seen as small-time digital experiments anymore. Instead they exemplify that the digital change in the industry now has very strong traction, and it is no longer a question of whether we will see such digitalization, but only how quickly it will become the norm amongst all players.

Disclaimer: Please note that I am advisor to both NYSHEX and Kontainers. Any numbers pertaining to these have been released and cleared by the companies themselves.