As Congress resumes sessions in Washington for the New Year, the American Trucking Association issued a press release on Wednesday asking lawmakers to move forward on many of the unaddressed issues that still plague the transportation industry. Some of the requests revolve around completing tasks already underway, and others bring up other longstanding issues, which Congress has…
Trucking associations and carrier companies have consistently fought the new truckers’ hours of service regulations implemented last June by the U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Motor Carriers Safety Administration. These regulations cut the number of hours truckers are able to work, thereby further limiting the ability of carriers to transport all of their loads in…
Over the past 30 years, U.S. manufacturing has undergone a tremendous loss because jobs were outsourced or moved overseas, where labor was cheap and readily available. However, the new resurgence in U.S. manufacturing is underway, as labor costs in the States becomes competitive with other parts of the world and the energy revolution allowed by newly developed…
The massive polar vortex, which has brought temperatures of below zero degrees Fahrenheit to regions stretching from Canada through the Deep South, is causing the earliest freeze of the shipping lanes in the Great Lakes since the 1930’s. Since freightliners are unable to break through these massive bodies of ice on their own, the Coast Guard…
UPS, and to a smaller degree FedEx, have fallen under fire by both consumers and retailers for failing to meet Christmas delivery deadlines. However, they were in fact victims of a perfect storm of problems that made on time deliveries impossible. According to industry sources, retailers and the weather conditions contributed to other problems, such as…
Following a 30-year lag in nuclear power plant building around the world, mostly due to environmental and political concerns, the U.K. nuclear supply chain has received a £13 million investment in order to construct the first nuclear power plant in the United Kingdom in 20 years. The money is coming from Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) and a number…
A recent poll conducted by SCM World surveyed Fortune Global 500 companies and determined that just 10 percent of the leadership positions within the supply chain are held by women. Part of the reason for this disparity is due to the roots of the supply chain, which lie in manufacturing and transportation, traditionally industries that did not…
Just as consumers are clamoring for the latest and greatest in industries such as technology, automobiles, home appliances, and electronics, they are also looking for newer and more interesting things to eat. In order to predict what’s going to be hot (and what’s not) for this year, the National Restaurant Association conducted a survey of…
LG, the South Korean manufacturer who took the consumer home appliance and electronics market by storm, is planning to announce that they are scaling down their production of personal computers heading into 2014. Part of the reason for the decision comes from the low market shares LG holds in the PC market. The other reason is the…
The giant logistics company DHL, recently released a report entitled “Big Data in Logistics.” The report concludes that someday logistics companies could become the go-to search engines for information on almost all other industries. Logistics companies gather a tremendous amount of information (big data) during the course of their normal operations. Information on the routes…