Wilson Logistics, a family-owned trucking and logistics provider based out of Springfield, Missouri, announced a recommitment to deploy 1,120 trucks in its flagship fleet with Pittsburgh-based Locomation Inc.'s autonomous trucking technology starting in late 2022 and continuing on over the course of the coming years.
The company's recommitment to Locomation comes following Wilson's December 2021 sale of its West Coast trucking operations to Ashley Pacific Northwest LLC, a subsidiary of Ashley Distribution Services (ADS) that delivers Ashley Furniture to Ashley stores and customers.
It was this division of Wilson's fleet, however, that was set to feature Locomation's tech following a prior commitment announcement to do so in March 2021, but the sale of it to ADS now has Wilson looking to deploy Locomation's tech onto the trucking company's flagship fleet, which operates in the middle and south-central regions of United States.
It's also in this area of the country that Wilson and Locomation are working together to identify six freight lanes between Wilson's hubs in Springfield and Dallas-Fort Worth. According to the two companies, these freight lanes have the potential to be valued at $524 million in annual revenue and $112 million in operating profits for Wilson, figures in part that will be realized due to the operational efficiencies that can be gained through Locomation's autonomy solutions.
"Since choosing Locomation we have studied these lanes and everything that goes into producing a high-utilization, reduced-GHG-emissions autonomous trucking operation for the shippers we serve,” Darrel Wilson, founder and CEO of Wilson Logistics, said in a statement. "Locomation’s Autonomous Relay Network, analytics, systems and algorithms give us an exceptional understanding of where the margins are and how best to harvest them moving forward. We knew from the start that this was a relationship we wanted to go deeper and further with."
With its Autonomous Relay Convoy (ARC) technology, Locomation can have two trucks electronically tethered for a two-part fleet that is led by a human driver in the first truck while a second driver rests in a follower truck that is operating autonomously behind the first. The trucks periodically swap places to allow the drivers to take turns sleeping, which also allows for the functioning time of the two trucks to reach between 20-22 hours per day, all while ensuring that the drivers remain within their operating hours of compliance as set by the U.S. Department of Transportation.
Wilson's recommitment to Locomation for its autonomy desires follows a September 2020 announcement that Locomation received its first-ever large-scale autonomous trucking purchase order from Wilson, the figure for which the companies did not disclose.
The Missouri company will be the first to deploy Locomation's tech at a commercial scale when it begins fitting its trucks with it by late 2022, though it's not the only company Locomation has partnered with to do so. By early 2023, Aliquippa-based PGT Trucking will do the same for some of the trucks in its fleet.
"We are thrilled to continue and deepen our partnership with Wilson," Çetin Meriçli, Locomation’s co-founder and CEO, said in a statement. "Locomation has built its route planning and autonomous truck technology to leverage the value of long-established trucking routes and systems, and Wilson Logistics is poised to become a leader in the race to implement a supply chain custom-built for autonomous trucks."
Meriçli co-founded Locomation in 2018 alongside a team of robotics and autonomy experts from Carnegie Mellon University’s National Robotics Engineering Center. The company has raised about $57 million to date, according to Crunchbase figures.
