ALLOWING shipping lines to profit from revenue management techniques used by airlines is the aim of a concept developed by Mizzen Group and Maxamation.

The two businesses have announced the launch of a joint product Plimsoll.io, built in response to Ocean Network Express’s dynamic pricing challenge as part of the third Ocean of Opportunities global Shipping and Logistics innovation challenge (or 03).

Plimsoll incorporates components used today by more than 40 airlines in 27 countries.

The teams have more than 25 years of experience in price optimisation, liner trade management, big data, digital transformation and digital product development.

The O3 challenge judges said the teams behind Plimsoll.io had taken a very innovative approach.

O3 Judge Thomas Ting said the Mizzen Group and Maxamation solution had a “very good potential to scale into different business areas (such as) freight forwarding and even non-containerised cargo (pricing)”.

Mizzen Group managing director Jon Charles said it was fantastic to be recognised by industry leaders and win the O3 challenge with Maxamation.

“The Maxamation partnership adds valuable capability to Mizzen’s trade manager software. Liner trade management is a complex task being made more so by the rapid uptake of the digital channel,” Mr Charles said.

“The window of opportunity to respond to changes in market conditions becomes smaller. It is virtually impossible for a trade manager to monitor and react to these opportunities manually.

“Integration with Maxamation software provides this actionable insight, it empowers trade managers’ decision making with technology.”

Maxamation CEO Peter Brewer said for more than twenty years they had provided revenue management solutions to airlines around the world.

“We see an immense opportunity to work with Mizzen Group and combine our forecasting and optimising applications with their executional software to create Plimsoll.io and enable the container shipping lines, or any transport asset operator, to achieve comparable results.”

Mr Charles said the industry was poised to move into the next phase of digitisation.

“The majority of solutions in the market are focused on bringing efficiencies to the current business practice – essentially doing the same thing but in a digital format,” he said. Mr Charles said there was a “clear digital divide between the few enabled shipping lines and the rest of the market”.