StarTrack Courier, the same-day delivery division of Australia Post, and Adiona Tech, a Sydney-based logistics software provider, announced early successes from their partnership to deploy advanced route optimisation solutions.
StarTrack Courier turned to route optimisation technology after losing a significant long-term customer who cited 3-4 key reasons needed for improvement with outdated route planning as one of these improvement areas.
After experiencing subpar service with a competitor, the customer returned for a multi-year, multi-million-dollar commitment. They were impressed by the steps we had taken in addressing their feedback and prior concerns & how swiftly we moved to address some of these key areas.
“They were quite impressed with what we had done in such a short period of time, because it was only three to four months from when they exited to when we started speaking again. In that time, we went to market, figured out the solution we wanted, went through procurement, and deployed it. Pretty unheard of for a company of our size,” says National Business Improvement and Implementation Manager, Christopher Cano.
“We’ve been around for over 200 years, but our technology doesn’t have to be prehistoric. We can be at the forefront of transport and logistics by utilising technology like Adiona.”
StarTrack Courier has successfully applied Adiona’s optimisation across multiple operations, including:
- Dynamic daily routing
- Bulk distribution customers
- On demand courier routes
- Set scheduled runs
- Future network planning
- Driver deployment optimisation
Key outcomes of these initiatives include:
Customer retention: Another StarTrack Courier customer approached Chris’ team with feedback that they were thinking of leaving StarTrack Courier, which also meant their entire Australia Post account could be at risk which was close to $7-7.5 million in total value.
The customer asked for a 10 per cent reduction in their rates, or to reduce driving time from roughly 135 hours a day to 110 or less. Using Adiona, the driving hours were recalculated to be 115-120 hours per day. While this wasn’t the number the customer wanted, Cano’s team was able to demonstrate that this was a realistic reduction that factored in all business considerations.
“The software helped show them that there can be improvements,” says Chris. “But then it also helped underpin what’s realistic.”
Operational efficiency and new business acquisition
Modelling the impact of a new customer on existing routes and fleets used to take weeks and would include ArcGIS and data science teams. Now, dispatchers and operations team members are producing service level agreements that accurately reflect what StarTrack Courier can deliver.
Quickly addressing new business inquiries frees up the team’s capacity to think bigger, Chris explained.
“You start future thinking and saying ‘can I use it for demand planning’ or ‘how many drivers do I need’ and ‘based on those extra drivers tell me what’s the most efficient run’. So it’s moving away from trying to be reactive to being proactive and preemptive.”
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