McLeod: Gradual trucking growth allows carriers to invest in systems

Trucking and freight brokerage solutions provider has seen revenue grow sizably in last few years.    Times are good for the trucking and freight brokerage solutions provider McLeod Software.
   Steady growth in domestic tonnage since the economic downturn has heralded sizable growth for the company and allowed carriers to invest in systems, McLeod President and Chief Executive Officer Tom McLeod said in a press briefing Monday at the company’s user conference in Washington, D.C.
   McLeod said the gradual increase in trucking volume over the past four-plus year “has given carriers confidence and time to make investments in their operations that they don’t have when things are so tight.”
   The implication is that when capacity is tight, and rates high, trucking companies are too busy managing day-to-day operations and enjoying higher rates to think about major business process changes, software implementations and training.
   “We’re finding they’re making the kinds of investments we don’t usually see until the end of a boom cycle,” McLeod said.
   To wit, McLeod said his company’s revenue and staff have tripled in recent years, as mid-size carriers and brokers seek out backbone systems that will help them become more efficient, win more business, and derive the difference between a good piece of business and one not worth chasing.
   While the bulk of McLeod’s customers come from the over-the-road carrier and mid-size freight brokerage markets (he said most carriers also run their broker module for their non-asset divisions), the company is “making inroads in the (less-than-truckload) marketplace.”
   “So many of the LTL carriers are on aging legacy systems,” he said. “They’re beginning to wonder what the next steps are.”
   While admitting that the LTL market was much smaller in size than the truckload market, he said those growth opportunities were exciting. He also said some of the same dynamics are affecting the mid-sized truckload carriers that haven’t used systems from McLeod or its competitors.
   “There are significant opportunities with carriers using our technology for them to use it more fully,” he said. “But there are a surprising number of mid-sized fleets that still haven’t used the options out there. And the larger companies, your companies among the top 100 that are still on aging legacy platforms, the effort to make a change is substantial. But there’s great potential for those large companies to be on a platform that lets them take advantage of the technology available.”
   When asked whether McLeod, whose growth has largely come organically, might be in acquisition mode, he said the company would only seek to acquire in a space where it could immediately compete, if not as a market leader.
   “We’re not in an acquisition mode, but we’re keeping our eyes open,” McLeod said. “Software solutions these days have to be full-grown when they’re born.”
   The company has been building out its suite of offerings, including a new bid and rate management module for carriers and brokers released in spring, new billing functionality, document flow tools, and a branded app that lets carriers provide visibility to their customers under their own brand, not McLeod’s.
   McLeod’s solutions have essentially been evolving from strict back-end software for carriers and brokers into tools that let those service providers connect and provide visibility to their customers more effectively.