FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Break Through Technology for Transportation Carriers

Contact: David McCarty
Address: 901 Wall Street Norman, Oklahoma 73069
Phone: 800-353-3696 x29  Mon-Fri 8am – 5pm CDT
Alternate Phone Number: 405-364-5473
Email: dmccarty@intelek-tech.com
URL: www.stripminer.net

Norman, OK – Intelek Technologies, a Norman based software development company, released StripMiner Screen Scraper software on March 17, 2008. This hosted software service is poised to revolutionize the way trucking companies and freight carriers obtain load shipments from online sources by completely automating the acceptance process.

The final release of StripMiner Screen Scraper hosted services increases efficiency, reduces carrier costs and data entry errors.  Trucking companies using StripMiner will be able to operate more efficiently on shrinking margins and quickly locate shipments that are more profitable.

Lately, trucking companies around the nation are taking a one-two punch: dramatically rising fuel and operational costs and increasing competition for load shipments. To combat these pressures, more and more carriers are turning to loads posted online by manufacturers and online load brokers.

StripMiner Screen Scraper software automatically watches a carrier’s trading partner website for loads that meet pre-defined business rules. These business rules can be simple or very complex. The carrier works with the experts at Intelek Technologies to ensure the business rules will match loads that the carrier really wants and ignore those loads that do not.

By Aaron Huff - reposted from CCJ Magazine - http://www.etrucker.com/apps/news/article.asp?id=66461

Strip-mining the Web for loads
Any eBay user knows the frustration of losing a bid in the final seconds. Today, savvy eBay enthusiasts use automated bidding tools such as EZ Sniper (www.ezsniper.com) that give the competition no time to respond to their closing bids. They also can keep their knowledge of the value of items private.

With freight slow, many carriers also are scavenging the Web for spot loads. Until recently, this wasn’t too difficult, as there were but a handful of significant load boards. But according to the research firm ARC, most large shippers have built, or are in the processes of building, Web portals for carriers to login and view, bid on and accept loads. Shippers also are requiring carriers to enter these Web portals regularly to update the delivery status of loads.

For years, carriers have used software that automates these routine load transactions with shippers via electronic data interchange. The market is changing, however. EDI is still the standard, but its use is becoming more limited as shippers seek ways to reduce costs.

As a result, many carriers that use EDI now are visiting one or more shipper websites manually throughout the day to find loads to transport on their equipment, or to broker out to other carriers.

“One of our EDI customers posts loads on a website, and these loads are available for low bidding,” says Kenny Cornett, vice president of operations for D&D Sexton Inc., a refrigerated truckload carrier based in Carthage, Mo. “All other loads are EDI offer, a phone call or e-mail offer when we are not primary or secondary on a lane.”

Naturally, the number of websites monitored by carriers will increase according to the size of their operations. The impact is more administrative costs – and more room for human error.

“The problem right now is that carriers have people sitting in front of a machine, hitting the refresh button looking for new loads,” says David McCarty, marketing director of Intelek Technologies. “It is very human- and time-intensive.”

So Intelek (www.intelek-tech.com) soon will release a new load automation tool called StripMiner. The software was developed to gather loads continuously from multiple trading partner websites.

By Aaron Huff - reposted from PrivateFleets.com - http://www.privatefleets.com/blog/2008/01/12/mining-the-web-for-loads/
January 12th, 2008

If you’ve ever set your sights on an item on eBay, you’ve experienced the frustration of losing your bid in the closing seconds. The competition might have been a savvy eBay enthusiast using an automated, last-second bidding tool such as EZ Sniper (www.ezsniper.com) that gives no one time to respond to their bid and keeps their knowledge of the value of the item private.

In the transportation industry, scavenging for loads on shippers’ websites is beginning to follow a similar trend. Most large shippers have built, or are in the processes of building, Web portals that carriers use to view, bid on, and accept available loads. Shippers also require carriers to use these same Web portals to update the delivery status of loads.

Many carriers have already invested in software to automate the basic transportation transactions via electronic data interchange. However, EDI is no longer a competitive differentiator in this new environment. EDI is used to exchange load offers and load acceptances between shippers and carriers, but it is typically used just for those loads and lanes that are already under contract.

Increasingly, carriers that use EDI are manually visiting various shipper websites to find loads to transport on their equipment or to broker out to other carriers. To a lessor extent, private fleets may have to search several load boards for backhauls or monitor shipper websites as well.

By Aaron Huff - reposted from CCJ Magazine http://www.etrucker.com/apps/news/article.asp?id=64053

Most large shippers either use or are in the process of developing Web portals that enable carriers to manually exchange EDI transactions, according to analyst firm ARC Advisory Group. Many carriers that already have EDI systems have automated load tendering from shippers for contracted loads, but they still have to monitor shippers' websites to grab non-contracted loads to move on their own fleet or to broker out to other carriers.

"Only one of our EDI customers posts loads on a website, and these loads are available for low bidding," says Kenny Cornett, vice president of operations for D&D Sexton Inc., a refrigerated truckload carrier based in Carthage, Mo. "All others are EDI offer, a phone call or email offer when we are not primary or secondary on a lane."

Regardless of fleet size and technology sophistication, manually searching for loads is a tedious process. The only competitive advantage is the speed of your mouse--until now.