There’s a gathering storm at world ports, best exemplified by the congestion at Los Angeles and Long Beach terminals in the U.S. According to the Marine Exchange of Southern California, more than 60 container ships carrying clothing, furniture and electronics worth billions of dollars are waiting to unload (source). An inability to deal with mounting demand at the leading U.S. port complex, which handles more than 50% of American imports, has led to increased congestion.
Global supply chain disruptions have taken their toll during an unprecedented health crisis. All of which amounts to a major headache for ports. As maritime trade faces a host of multifaceted challenges that threaten economies, think of today’s ports as a sprinter that does not have the right running shoes. Performing optimally without the right gear is just not possible.
Faced with chronic delays and uncertain deliveries, many U.S. companies have been forced to increase their inventory levels. According to the National Customs Brokers & Forwarders Association of America, Nike spends $200 million annually to carry an extra 7 to 14 days of inventory because of the unreliable transportation caused by port congestion. In March 2021, it reported its North America revenues were down 11%, due to shipment delays of over three weeks, per The Wall Street Journal.
While companies are placing precautionary orders to maintain stock, consumers are facing higher and product shortages running into the holiday season. Ports are in a central position facing congestions and delays on both seaside and Hinterland operations. Congestion is exacerbated by a shortage of truck drivers and trucks to haul containers.
Despite these challenges and others, help is on hand for ports. Ericsson offers proven, tested and reliable wireless connectivity, which enables smarter solutions to help improve operations and visibility across container supply chains. We’ll outline how a private network enables port systems to operate safely and more efficiently, without reducing the workforce or cutting out the supply chain.
We singled out the Los Angeles port complex in our introduction. Earlier this month, the port decided to operate 24 hours a day to clear the long queues of cargo ships waiting. As L.A. adjusts to its fresh challenge it could learn from the Rotterdam World Gateway port, which has managed to keep its operation going 24/7 for two years without an outage of their wireless communication system. At Rotterdam, Ericsson provided a private LTE network to enable reliable and quality communication services for its automated container terminal – replacing a legacy Wi-Fi network, which was unreliable, insecure, and costly to maintain and run.
Ericsson delivered a better alternative via a fully redundant, highly available and secure private LTE network. The end-to-end solution, based on privately owned spectrum in the 3.5Ghz range, enables robust and cost-effective data communication for approximately 100 clients on the container terminal. The network supports data communications between the customer application server and Automated Guided Vehicles (AGV), routing of the AGV between the modem and applications behind it, data communications towards the workflow terminal in manned-trucks, and data communications towards ruggedized tablets in use between container stacks, among other applications.
In addition to contiguous uptime for nearly two years – a notable feat by itself – the Rotterdam results also include improved performance, reliability, and data security, and secure remote access for monitoring and control. The network can also be scaled to add more capacity and additional use-cases as the port’s needs and systems evolve.
Such advantages and improvements are available to ports of any size or scale, as a private network can be tailored to meet the specific needs of the operation. In doing so, port operators and workers can benefit from better asset tracking and inventory, a workforce management system that provides process and workflow automation, and predictive maintenance. Imagine the other benefits that real-time monitoring and real-time location information could offer to help workers improve operations, be more efficient, and safer.
Ericsson’s vision is to help streamline communications across the supply chain workflows. Imagine how productive and efficient we could be if we could achieve this across rail, ports, ground transportation, and more. Private networks are a step in the right direction, and it’s thrilling to think about how this readily available technology could help unblock one of the biggest choke points in the global supply-chain crisis.
To learn more about solutions, check out our Connected Ports report, a joint report by Ericsson, ifm, and Arthur D Little that examines and quantifies the potential value of private cellular networks for the ports industry.
Source: Ericsson