Cargo Community Systems and the power of connection

The airfreight community has seen a surge in digitalization since March 2020 as stakeholders have upgraded systems to keep cargo moving while the world shut down. The cargo community system (CCS) is a digital solution now in the limelight as dozens of airports and cargo stakeholders shift to cloud-based models that aid the secure exchange of information between them, resulting in reduced congestion, increased data visibility and faster moving volumes. While CCSs have only been around for a decade, more airports and ground handlers are now buying into the technology as a viable solution to connect their cargo communities. “We’ve seen in the past that a lot of optimizations have been going on within the four walls of a company,” Joke Aerts, director of marketing for CCS developer Nallian, told Air Cargo World. “But the moment you step out of those four walls and you need to align with other stakeholders, that’s where the mess starts — because your visibility and your productivity or planning goes only as far as your own four walls. What we want to help the world achieve is that people can operate as one … so that in the end, freight just runs smoother.” The main players India-based Kale Logistics and Belgium-headquartered Nallian are the two main developers of the airport CCS. Their solutions are 100% cloud-based, meaning there is no physical infrastructure required for implementation, only internet access and login credentials. A CCS is designed to unify operations across the airport, optimize cargo movement and reduce silos in workflow, Aerts said. While some airports implement entire systems, others pick and choose from the provider’s menu of offerings such as truck management , slot booking or paperless forms for a slower integration. An airport doesn’t need to start with all elements of a system, Aerts added, but can focus on one solution before expanding the CCS. A CCS also doesn’t require cargo stakeholders to abandon their other systems and workflows, Kale Chief Executive Amar More told Air Cargo World. Operators can use their own interfaces alongside the Kale or Nallian systems and simply enable the features they want at the moment. “We’ve noticed, on the one hand, a growing digitalization or more openness toward digitalization [since March 2020],” Nallian’s Aerts said. “But on the other hand, cargo was the only thing that kept flying [during COVID-19 lockdowns], so there was a growing interest in cargo and a growing appetite for streamlining operations.” A common reason cited for CCS implementation is congestion reduction, Kale’s More said, something COVID-19 exacerbated at airports. Airports want to move cargo faster, with less lag time and more accurate timing, and a CCS can provide slot management, transparency in cargo shipments, security measures and customs clearance, getting airfreight off a truck and onto a plane faster than manual processes allow. Visibility continues to drive digitalization as well, as cargo stakeholders across the airport have a growing need for documentation and declaration access, More said. “When you create a cloud, and people exchange information, you solve these problems, you solve the problems of congestion,” he said. Europe gets connected The CCS trailblazers have been European airports and their stakeholders, which have been implementing them since the mid-2010s. Brussels Airport (BRU) was an early CCS adopter, forming BRUcargo in 2014 through the collaboration of various cargo stakeholders, including airlines, customs, handling agents and industrial shippers via the BRUCloud data exchange platform . BRUcargo, designed in part by Nallian, provides visibility on the end-to-end cargo journey through the airport, as the CCS extends across stakeholder operations, Geert Aerts, director of cargo and logistics at BRU, told Air Cargo World . “By providing that visibility, the different players can better anticipate what's coming in from forwarder to handler, and from handler to airline,” Geert Aerts said. “But it certainly also improves processes.” The increased visibility has also led to productive competition between operators, Nathan De Valk, head of cargo at BRU owner Brussels Airport Company, told Air Cargo World . “We use it to benchmark the different operators against one another,” De Valk said. “So that’s a powerful social control, you could call it, within the community. They want to compete with each other to be the best.” In 2019, Liege Airport (LGG) employed Nallian’s Air Cargo suite and Vienna Airport (VIE) digitized some of its workflows with Nallian’s technology, creating Vienna CargoCloud. VIE, which aimed to grow its business through digitization, reduce congestion, increase security in cargo areas and enable better visibility in cargo streams, according to a Nallian release. Luxembourg Airport (LUX) followed in 2020, implementing the entire CCS, starting with perishables and live animal shipments before rolling out to all cargo and companies. Amsterdam Airport Schiphol (AMS) developed its CCS with Cargonaut in 2020, with the goal of being more competitive and sustainable as a cargo hub, Luc Scheidel, Schiphol’s cargo network director, told Air Cargo World. “As an industry, we need to implement new ways of data exchange based on APIs, common agreements and principles as using data from the source and data sovereignty,” Scheidel said. Since implementing its CCS, AMS has seen truck wait times drop an average of 30 minutes with its digital pre-notification between forwarders, truckers and handlers, Scheidel added. In May, Ostend-Bruges (OST) announced it would utilize Nallian’s Cargo Cloud to streamline truck visits, perishable inspection and compliance checks, according to the release. Although Frankfurt Airport (FRA) does not have a fully integrated CCS, the airport has implemented digital solutions to improve the cargo-handling process. For instance, Frankfurt Cargo Services (FCS), an affiliate of ground handler Worldwide Flight Services (WFS), adopted Germany-based software company Dakosy’s FAIR@Link digital Ramp Control System in April in order to speed cargo handling and reduce truck waiting times. The world beyond plugs in While many of Europe’s major cargo hubs use a CCS, the rest of the world has only begun catching up. Singapore Changi (SIN), alongside India’s Bangalore (BLR) and Mumbai (BOM) airports, are the only major airports to adopt a CCS in the Asia-Pacific region. SIN launched its CCS in summer 2020, and BLR completed implementation earlier this year. “In the age of digitalisation, no airport can afford to ignore technology adoption,” a BLR spokesperson told Air Cargo World. “ The implementation of [BLR’s CCS] has helped in eliminating paperwork, enabling faster processing of transactions, reducing duplication of information and streamlining processes, and making information available prior to cargo reaching the airport.” Kale started its work in India with BOM and now has 46 airports interested in or actively using a CCS, many of which are in Asia-Pacific and the Middle East, Kale’s More said. Africa has been the slowest region for digital adoption, but North America particularly lagged in CCS adoption. Meanwhile, in the Middle East, Dubai World Central (DWC) and Dubai International (DXB) are the sole a CCS utilizers in the region, leveraging Kale’s airport cargo community e-commerce platform for dnata since 2021. Emirates-owned ground handler dnata opted into a CCS in an effort to reduce costs, add visibility and create a more sustainable workflow with paperless and cashless automation, according to a March 2021 release. In North America, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta (ATL) was the first airport in the U.S. to utilize a CCS in 2020, and since then, three U.S. airports have joined in CCS adoption — John F. Kennedy (JFK), Dallas Fort Worth (DFW) and Philadelphia (PHL). Most recently, Chicago Rockford International (RFD) announced a partnership with Kale for a CCS on Sept. 6. Vancouver (YVR) is the first Canadian airport to jump on Kale’s CCS, with plans to implement later this year. YVR will target creating digital trade lanes and increasing market share with the CCS, More told Air Cargo World in July. Next in the U.S., Miami International Airport (MIA) also is considering a CCS, according to airport documents, but MIA’s Vertically Integrated Cargo Community would not be implemented until 2027. Challenges in adoption While a fully functional, completely integrated airport CCS has numerous benefits, getting all community members on board can be its own problem. "Making a cargo cloud a success requires the airport or stakeholders association to play an active role in the initiative, amongst others, to unite and guide the different stakeholders,” Nallian chief executive Jean Verheyen said in a May release. Some airports haven’t changed their processes for 70 years, making change management the biggest hurdle to clear, More said. “This is a slow process, you know, it takes time for the community behavior to change,” he said. “Sometimes it takes seven, eight months, sometimes it takes two years depending upon the willingness of community to adopt to the processes and the willingness of airport to enforce you know those things.” More used the example of “carrot and stick,” when it comes to stakeholder incentives — the airport must either reward or discipline behaviors to engage all parties. “If [airport leaders] keep an approach of inviting everyone on a collaborative platform, explaining this to them, but after you’ve done that, you understand that some quarters are misunderstanding it or are against this democratization of technology, then the airport has to get its ‘stick,’” he said. BRU experienced pushback from its forwarders initially, but to date, BRU’s Aerts has not seen any “major operational hiccups” as a result of implementing BRUcargo. BRU has not had extended queuing times or disruptions in terms of lost cargo, More noted. BLR found its biggest challenge not in digitization but in integrating staff and partners into the CCS, the spokesperson said. The airport’s solution has been to have frequent feedback meetings with various groups in addition to training for workers to understand employees’ needs. AMS also cited on-boarding as a challenge, as companies need to understand and implement the system in addition to connecting their own IT systems. AMS also requires parties utilizing Cargonaut to pay a subscription fee, which in turn funds the CCS, Scheidel said. Another challenge was finding multilingual trainers to help onboard partners, the BLR spokesperson said. “We were unsure how to break down the text in a way that would be understandable to someone who did not speak English as their first language,” the spokesperson added. “We have been able to successfully overcome the initial hurdles and have managed to achieve around 95% adoption of the CCS amongst the cargo community at BLR Airport.” Despite challenges in bringing stakeholders onboard, CCSs have steadily gained traction — first in Europe and now across the globe. This increased adoption and wave of digitalization spurred by pandemic-related lockdowns is by no means a phase as airports continue to expand and develop their CCS, rather than abandon them. The results stakeholders have seen, from streamlined operations to reduced costs, prove that it pays to get connected.

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