Haulynx integrates truck routing to its load-matching solution

Haulynx, an Internet of Things (IoT) technology company, has announced the incorporation of a turn-by-turn navigation feature into its solution, helping interstate freight carriers use it along with Haulynx’s primary load-matching solution. The truck routing feature was developed in association with the location data platform Mapbox.

“Haulynx provides free products and services to freight carriers in the transportation industry. Our recent integration allows truckers to use the truck routing application on our free electronic logging device (ELD), which is within the same application as the smart load-matching algorithm,” said Anthony Kamar, founder and CEO of Haulynx.

Unlike the navigation tools currently available in the market, Haulynx’s routing solution is not just about providing turn-by-turn navigation. The tool allows truckers to input various parameters like truck dimension, freight weight, and remaining hours of service (HOS), which it processes to accurately provide the estimated time of arrival (ETA).   

The inherent advantage that drivers have is that they can use the same application to find loads and for truck routing, without flipping back and forth between two different applications. And for truckers syncing the application with the Haulynx ELD, the process is much more seamless, as the company extracts geographical location, pick-up and drop-off times, and the remaining HOS, directly from the device to precisely identify trucker preferences and availability for new loads.

“We offer loads based not just on a trucker’s eligibility to take out loads based on their equipment type, but also optimize options based on geographical position and HOS, to maximize the cargo that he can pick in a given HOS cycle,” said Kamar.

While working with Mapbox, Haulynx redesigned its app to make it more map-centric by displaying information graphically – for instance, by broadcasting loads offered in a specific location by layering it over the map for a better visual understanding.  

“The tool also provides features like geofencing, which helps brokers know when a truck has arrived and left from a pick-up and delivery location,” said Steve Collette, COO at Haulynx. “This is critical because it allows us to give freight brokers visibility on their load and to monitor what is happening in real-time.”

Collette explained that Haulynx’s business model was about providing all the trucker-related services for free – including the ELD hardware and its associated software. And also since all the services are integrated on the same platform, many truckers are inclined to use Haulynx, thus helping the company gain a larger customer base in a shorter time.

“This way, we can give a trucker more information and help with future decisions. For example, if a trucker is navigating to New York, based on his hours of service we can predict when he would reach the city, his load availability at that time, and also when he would be next available to pick up a load,” said Kamar.

Haulynx is now working on incorporating another tool – an augmented reality feature called Vision SDK, an application developed by Mapbox to bridge the phone camera and the vehicle, to give drivers a better driving experience through three-dimensional traffic and navigation displays. The Vision SDK uses the mobile camera to capture images, which it relays to computer vision algorithms that creates an augmented reality output, providing a map that is overlaid on reality.

Collette believes that this would help further expand the services of Haulynx, and attract more users to the platform. When the company began, its base was primarily Arizona, California and the southwestern U.S., but now with more than 4,000 ELDs slated to go out in the next couple of months, the company is looking at a far wider geographic spread.