TRI-VIZOR

TRI-VIZOR[1] is the first impartial orchestrator for transport and logistics, that prepares, designs, and operates horizontal partnerships and collaborative communities among shippers. The company, originally raised as a spin-off of the University of Antwerp in 2008, offers specialized knowledge and solutions to prepare, create, support, and orchestrate flow bundling and horizontal partnerships in transport and logistics.

In the framework of CO3 project[2], a horizontal collaboration community in fresh & chilled retail distribution between 2 Fast Moving Consumer Goods shippers (Nestlé & PepsiCo), a logistics service provider (STEF) and a neutral trustee (TRIVIZOR) was created. In 2010, the Belgilux Association of Branded product Manufacturers (BABM) brought together a group of retail suppliers to identify potential consolidation opportunities. The project took 2 years to reach its implementation phase with two companies, PepsiCo and Nestlé. The distribution synergy between the Belgian fresh networks of Nestlé and PepsiCo was simulated and the potential consolidation gain was calculated by the neutral trustee TRI-VIZOR in an ‘offline’ mode.

Subsequently, a community was built around the two companies with TRI-VIZOR as the trustee providing the appropriate governance framework. A joint Request for Proposal was launched by TRI-VIZOR on behalf of the two companies to select the most adequate logistics service provider to organize the operational aspects (warehousing and transport). The logistics service provider that was selected in this case was STEF, a European logistics service provider that specializes in temperature-controlled logistics.

Since all logistical processes were managed by STEF, they were also fully responsible for the management of the administrative and financial flows. The neutral trustee performed periodic audits to make sure that the agreed gain sharing principles were respected in the invoicing by STEF and to ensure that the collaboration kept running smoothly.

A very important aspect of this horizontal collaboration was how to cope with anti-trust laws. As Nestlé and PepsiCo are competitors, antitrust compliance was crucial and e.g. detailed cost or order information could not be shared amongst both parties. Company-sensitive information was therefore only shared with the TRI-VIZOR. The process was closely monitored by a specialized external lawyer and by the legal departments of both PepsiCo and Nestlé.

The PepsiCo-Nestlé project was ground-breaking and attracted a lot of attention and exposure leading to prizes and awards. In 2014, the project won the European CO³ Award. The project was granted with the 2014 Prize of the Audience of the Supply Chain Award, organized by VIB – The Belgian Procurement and Logistics Association. In 2015, the project won the prestigious European Supply Chain Project of the Year Award of the European Logistics Association (ELA).

After CO3, TRI-VIZOR has further developed its strong vision on how logistics and supply chain management will evolve in the coming years. In essence, they claim that current business models in transport and logistics will fail due to low efficiencies caused by fragmentation and important capacity shortages. The new business models for smart and sustainable logistics will be based on sharing capacity, i.e. bundling of flows, clustering of activities, sharing services and pooling resources. TRI-VIZOR has demonstrated that horizontal partnerships and platforms are the most fair and appropriate way to realize this. Nowadays, in its role as neutral orchestrator, TRI-VIZOR prepares, involves and supports companies in the processes of creation (as ‘architect’) and managing (as ‘trustee’) horizontal collaboration partnerships and platforms.

Some other innovative and ground-breaking projects of TRI-VIZOR include FJORDFRENDE (https://www.fjordfrende.no/) and CULT (https://www.cultcitylogistics.be/).