Domtar saves millions of dollars and improves customer delivery service with solution from Princeton TMX

The Challenge

Freight operations are a vital but costly part of the business for Domtar Corporation, one of the largest manufacturers of paper and other forest products in North America. So in place of traditional, largely manual methods of managing round-the-clock freight needs, Domtar opted to automate that process at several of its mill sites and distribution centers in the United States and Canada. As a result, Domtar realized millions of dollars in annual savings. 

The Solution

To accomplish this, Domtar didn't have to add to investments to in-house information technology. Instead it signed up for an on-demand transportation management system (TMS) from Princeton TMX, based in Fort Wayne, Indiana, using the Software as a Service (SaaS) model. The SaaS business model provides application functionality through a subscrip- tion model over the Internet. A customer does not own the software but instead rents a total solution that is delivered remotely. With a SaaS model-based offering, a customer eliminates the cost of developing, buying and maintaining an in-house technology solution. A customer no longer needs to support multiple platforms or versions. 

"Today, we have clear, real-time control over deliveries because of Princeton TMX and spending on freight reduced by 18.7 percent in the first year and on-time deliveries from connected sites improved."

Continual Access Through the Web 

Princeton TMX continues to create and support Transportation Management Software for many companies. Shippers, such as Domtar, which is headquartered in Montreal, Canada, along with their transportation providers, have continual access to the service through Web interfaces, each one customized for the individual shipper. And customer charges are "success based," which means the customer is billed only for successful outcomes. The application is a rules-based logistics tool that automatically tenders load offerings to the carriers, schedules pickups and deliveries, and tracks the progress of each load while maintaining constant integrated communications between carrier and shippers. At the Domtar operational headquarters in Fort Mill, South Carolina, Princeton TMX lifted a large daily workload from both the sales-services and truck-services groups there and freed them to focus more on their customers. 

In the first year of implementation, and with fewer than a quarter of Domtar mills and distribution centers using the Princeton TMX solution, the company realized an 18.7 percent drop - amounting to millions of dollars annually in spending on freight among those sites, said David White, the company director of transportation. 

Even more important was the improvement in supply- chain visibility, White said. "Before this, there was a lot of hope involved in the timing of our deliveries, and you can't run a successful business on hope. Today, we have clear, real-time control over deliveries, which have improved, White explained.