Miami airport to deploy shared logistics platform for cargo community

“This is about making Miami International Airport more future-ready: simplifying and expediting the movement of goods through our global gateway, supporting the businesses and jobs that depend on international trade, and ensuring that our airport remains an industry leader not just in cargo volume, but also in efficiency and sustainability,” said Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava in a news release announcing the project.

The mayor also spoke about the benefits of the air cargo community system during a press conference on Tuesday at The International Air Cargo Association’s biannual convention here.

Miami International Airport handled a record 3.4 million tons of freight in 2025, up 9.4% since 2024. It is has surpassed Chicago and Los Angeles as the busiest non-express cargo airport in the continental United States and the largest in the world for international capacity, excluding narrow-body aircraft.

MIA’s cargo traffic is made possible by about 190 cargo-only flights per day and more than 1,600 daily truck trips. Airport and country officials say that coordinating truck trips so that truckers don’t arrive unannounced and create long queues while they sort out paperwork and payments will significantly improve efficiency and carbon emissions. 

Atlanta-based Kalé will hold community workshops starting in January to gather input about stakeholder requirements and expectations and then implement the system over a period of 18 months, CEO Amar More told FreightWaves. 

Some airports only deploy a handful of modules, but MIA plans to implement the whole cargo community system, starting with electronic document sharing and truck traffic management, he said. 

Kalé’s system will sit on the front end and have application programming interfaces, or middleware, that connect to each entity involved in moving cargo through MIA.

Why It Matters: Cargo trucks traditionally arrive at airports with limited information about the load and its availability for pickup, causing congestion at busy times. The new platform is expected to improve information sharing, advanced planning and truck scheduling, and help reduce waiting times at MIA. It will also allow MIA to connect with other airports for better planning of international imports and exports. 

“Today, as a freight forwarder or a trucking company in Miami, you’re accessing one system at a time. A truck that goes and drops off at Worldwide Flight Services can’t easily coordinate its next move to pick up cargo at the Swissport ground handling facility,” More said in an interview. 

Artificial intelligence will guide the parties through their workflows. Using traffic pattern prediction and wait time data, it will tell truckers, for example, how much time they can expect to spend unloading at their first destination and when to optimally schedule an appointment at the next ground handling facility for pick up, he explained.  Truckers can query a generative chatbot in English or Spanish, to get information, such as whether a shipment is ready for pick up.

AI will also help terminal operators identify trade flows and patterns, perhaps alerting them in September to expect an influx of electronic shipments because a technology company is launching a new product.

In another AI use case, a documentation agent will allow users to upload a PDF copy of a document and it will convert the information into the format the receiver’s system can accept. 

Kalé systems are currently operating at airports in Atlanta, Boston and at the Worldwide Flight Services facility at JFK New York, with implementation underway in Philadelphia and at Chicago-Rockford.

Some of the most established air cargo community systems are in Europe. Brussels airport was one of the first to implement such a system, powered by Nallian. It requires companies doing business at the airport to connect to its shared platform. 

Participation in the United States, so far, is voluntary. More said the adoption rate is about 90% at the WFS facility in New York, with other locations at about 60% to 70% participation levels. 

“The best community systems in the world have 98% to 99% adoption and that’s where the airport actually takes leadership and says, ‘Look, this is good for the overall community. If you have any concerns, let’s address those concerns. But, let’s get this done for everybody’. It’s a little bit of pain for 10 or 15 days, but then it falls in place,” More said.

Click here for more FreightWaves/American Shipper stories by Eric Kulisch.

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