A Trust Architecture for the Supply Chain of Tomorrow

Not every company can be like Amazon, fulfilling customer orders within a specified period of time (e.g., 2 business days). But what if they could?

Think of the supply chain as the engine that powers our global economy, moving our goods and services across different ecosystems. But as our connections grow, our logistics systems remain outdated and underutilized. Non-Amazon related businesses around the world face pressure to deliver on time and in full, but don’t have the necessary tools to execute contracts, take payments efficiently, and track deliveries, ensuring that goods arrive when they should.

Consequently, the supply chain faces billions of dollars in lost revenue as the result of late, lost, or inefficient deliveries.

Enter the ‘Movement Ecosystem’ (MOVA).

The Demand Yields Itself To Smart Contracts

Amazon has taken the market by storm, comprising 5-10% of UPS’s revenue. With such a huge network, the company has recently entered into the transportation and delivery markets, acknowledging that companies need to bridge the gap between customer orders, performance, and delivery time.

If Amazon can do it, why can’t anyone else? Having finally decided on the Austin, Texas market for its second headquarters (HQ2), Amazon again took the market by storm and is leading the space in expanding its supply-reach.

Well, Lachlan McDonald, founder and CEO of MOVA, believes others in the industry can do the same, and he aims to be the next to do so. Having spent the majority of his career in the oil and gas industry, McDonald has focused his time and energy on transformational work, looking into what drives these markets in terms of supply chain management.

McDonald believes the solution lies with smart contracts and utilizing a single blockchain for the entire industry.

How Do You Leverage A Smart Contract To Move Goods From Point A To Point B?

These businesses are sophisticated and have very intelligent people, but the problem is as soon as they try to communicate their ideas to the outside world, everything breaks down.

Lachlan McDonald, CEO/Founder of MOVA

So the question becomes, how do we create a smart contract that reduces the friction of the outside world, and gives measurable savings to both parties, providing each with a tangible, economical service?

Clear Terms

The advantage of using smart contracts in this space is that everyone knows what they are signing up for ahead of time. McDonald told me that utilizing GPS technology and building it into a smart contract allows suppliers to enter what information they need to, and identify what goods need to be moved and when. “At the end of the day, GPS technology operates as an independent variable,” says McDonald.

Taking the Amazon “track-n-ship” model to the next level, MOVA leverages the Ethereum blockchain to link producers and shipping providers with these automated contracts, allowing goods to be tracked in real time with GPS technology. For other suppliers and consumers, payments are instantaneous, with built-in incentive mechanisms for both suppliers and distributors.

McDonald’s platform utilizes smart contracts and mobile apps to monitor and manage supply chain logistics. The MOVA App features GPS integration to track goods as they move along the chain and creates a dual incentive model that benefits transporters and producers with bonus mechanisms for optimal delivery and compensates users for deliveries not made on time or in full.

Having the ability to set predefined shipping terms, customer information, and order information creates a database that a company can continue to use, modify, and build off as business continues to grow and the customer base continues to expand.

Accountability

When goods don’t reach their target destination on time, or even at all, who is to be held accountable? By utilizing smart contract technology, the question becomes how to incentivize people to be held accountable for their own behavior. McDonald takes things a step further and asks whether a company even has the data required to hold an individual or business accountable. Lastly, there needs to be an ability to enforce the contract, in the event that terms aren’t met.

Efficient Trucking

By utilizing the full potential of the trucks on the road, MOVA provides a global platform linking producers, movers, retailers, and consumers, letting them access and auction logistics capacity and use real-time performance data to drive business forward.

Creating a Global Logistics Marketplace On The Blockchain

The ultimate goal is to extend the blockchain across the global supply chain without creating fifty million systems. By initially focusing on the oil and gas sector, McDonald believes that by addressing a space that has a long, complex, and valuable supply chain, the utility will make itself known. “However, the scalability covers all industries—anything that moves, this tool can be utilized for,” says McDonald. This doesn’t just benefit smaller mail couriers, but also very large and complex resource companies, with market caps of $15+ billion.

McDonald says that MOVA recently signed a contract for an operational trial with Hastings Deering, one of the largest CAT dealers in the world, located in Australia.

What It Is Now

MOVA is a platform where people can go and utilize performance tools, pull monthly management reports, and see everything that moves and what the real performance was. You can actually pinpoint and track where fault lies, whether it’s an employee’s doing, or something back at the warehouse.

The core advantage of this as a performance tool is that the vast majority of the benefit goes to both parties. “MOVA aims to pump as many transactions and get as many customers through, rather than price-gauge existing customers,” says McDonald. It has to work for as many people as possible.

The Future

The vision involves implementing GPS and performance tools, then managing to link up huge amounts of suppliers, customers, and primary actors in the system. The traditional model is to capitalize on the data, monetize it, and keep it to yourself (think Facebook). A lot of blockchain developments are replicating that model. The question becomes how to make every truck on the road more efficient. How do you do that?

Overcoming Barriers To Shipment

All these barriers exist—everyone settles for the lowest or weakest link in the system, where goods sit at warehouse staging areas waiting to move. There’s not a lot of smarts in the supply chain, depending on the capacity of guys you’re using—and it’s difficult to go out and get new guys, because how do you know they are good performers? It costs money to tender.

MOVA will increase the market access of both customers and trucking companies. Trucking companies can access a global platform of new customers, allowing everyone to look at how they have dealt with their primary actors.

To implement a rating system is to auction off efficiently—a truck that’s going to Cincinnati half-full isn’t good for customers or the environment. By bridging the gap, you can share data on what’s being moved, reducing the barriers to getting new customers and vendors, creating a new global marketplace for capacity – the actual capacity sitting on the trucks. The best way to fill those trucks to capacity is to see customer orders down the street that you would never have seen in the past, making it more cost-effective for customers, and reducing the carbon footprints of every truck on the road.

How? Moving the right tons, at the right time.