Container Control, the new product from Container xChange, claims to solve two major pain points for shippers and Non Vessel Owning Common Carriers (NVOCCs) worldwide - monitoring containers in near real-time from pick-up to drop-off, and get a clear overview of all releases and containers they use.

“The customers can now add all the release references to the platform, so they can easily match all available containers with the shippers' bookings and get information about their movements. The data is collected directly from depots,” says the Container xChange release.

A Container xChange poll shows that 60 percent of freight forwarders, NVOCCs and merchants struggle to keep track of container pick-ups and drop-offs, their location and their timestamps. A whopping 57 percent of freight forwarders identify containers as their biggest challenge in the upcoming peak season and 43 percent of lack of real-time visibility as the second biggest challenge. "Container Control allows freight forwarders to track the pick-up, port of discharge, estimated arrival time and drop-off of each container."

“The idea is to automate the container management process for shippers so that they can focus less on manual operational workflows and more on expanding their business across different geographies,” said Johannes Schlingmeier, co-founder and CEO of Container xChange. “We provide them with the data and processes that simplify their business. And for the industry, it solves the challenge of monitoring and managing containers on a single, advanced platform.

Jack Sun, director of Orange Container Line said: “Monitoring container pick-up and drop-off on the Container xChange platform has been a valuable addition to our business. Previously, it was a very manual task that required a lot of resources and was prone to errors. Now we check it on xChange Container Control and get the overview of the container's journey on its way from point A to B and always on top of the whereabouts of our containers. I firmly believe that quickly automating our processes and deploying our best minds to leverage these technologies can help us scale our business."