In conversation with Mr Praveen Jain, co-founder of Onmove by Zast Logisolutions.

1. TheGizmoStar: Can you tell a little about Onmove as a high-speed long-distance trucking aggregator?   

Mr Praveen Jain: Onmove is an asset light, tech powered network and assisted marketplace defining “FTL Express” in the Indian Logistics space. 

We have identified that the Indian trucking space is marred with inefficiencies as the space is highly fragmented and dominated by small fleet operators who are limited by resources. With the objective to solve various problem through tech-led digital process and bring efficiencies to the overall ecosystem we have started our journey in 2015 to build an integrated digital platform that create efficiencies and delivers a mutually advantageous growth cycle to all stakeholders i.e. customers, fleet owners and drivers. 

Currently we have Pan-India and SAARC operations serving 50+ customers across Ecommerce, 3PL & courier, Retail, Pharma, Auto and FMCG segment through a network of 1000+ aggregated fleet dedicatedly running on our platform. Our USP is to fulfil on-demand one way requirements with reliable services consistently to customers, maximize the asset utilisation for fleet owners improving their margins and better earnings and social life for the drivers. 

2. TheGizmoStar: In the current scenario what’s the efficiency of truck transport?  

Mr Praveen Jain: The Indian trucking is highly inefficient that costs India 2% of its GDP. Key contributing factors are:

• No placement guarantee – There is information asymmetry in the market. To illustrate, in a market there are empty trucks waiting for cargo and cargo searching for empty trucks but due to lack of real-time information flow between these stakeholders increasing lead time and thus creating inefficiencies and higher cost. A truck in India runs an average of 7000kms a month which is around 3 times lower when compared to a developed economy leading to higher cost of logistics and thin margins for fleet owners as a significant chunk of total cost being fixed in nature. 
• No transit assurance – Due to low adoption of tech there is no end to end visibility in the overall chain making it unreliable. Due to non-reliability over delivery TAT’s a company needs to plan higher inventory levels leading to increased working capital needs and bigger warehousing space inflating the overall supply chain cost. 
• No Visibility – As the supply chain is still in nascent stage of tech adoption there is no real time visibility of cargo on the go increasing the cost on account of theft and damages.

3. TheGizmoStar: What are the current challenges and what is the problem it solves?

Mr Praveen Jain: As the industry is highly fragmented and dominated by small fleet owners and legacy players, it’s still working on traditional methodologies and manual process leading to inefficiencies at each stage. The key challenge for each stakeholder are as mentioned in point 2 above.  

We are solving these problems by creating a network of stakeholders connected through tech bringing end to end visibility across the ecosystem. The key aspects to our problem solving are:

• Curated aggregation of fleet solving the problem of reliability. 
• Digital load matching solving the problem of placement guarantees and asset utilisation. Further with our tech systems we shortened the working capital cycle for the fleet owners and pay them as per their needs to scale their business and grow with Onmove. 
• We run on a strict two driver model ensuring proper rest at regular intervals reducing chances of accidents due to fatigue and at the same time not hampering there income through optimal running of vehicle. Further with our data analytics and AI based planning drivers have better visibility of time to reach home and accordingly can have their social commitments planned.

Below is a glimpse of our business network and benefits to each stakeholder.  

4. TheGizmoStar: Who are your main competitors?

Mr Praveen Jain: We believe there is no concept of competition in this market on account of two factors: 

• Sheer size of the industry;
• And no single player how large it is without a cohesive approach across stakeholders can’t change the way industry works. 

With our objective of making this market efficient, every new entrant sharing the same objective as ours, we consider that as a step towards our objective and driving the change in industry we want and hence a contributor to our business growth. Further factors such as being asset light, major business contribution from on-demand one-way placement, consistently providing reliable services and tech at the core of business differentiates us from other players in the market.

5. TheGizmoStar: Your tagline reads “Truck doesn’t need to move faster, it needs to follow a superior process”.  Can you talk a little about this process?

Mr Praveen Jain: We believe there are no super trucks available that can run faster. Every truck is built with same engineering, uses the same road infrastructure and run by the same set of drivers however reaches a particular destination in 3 days sometimes and in 7 days another times establishing a fact that it’s not a question of running faster but being consistent. We believe with well stitched digital process, we can create an end to end visibility making the trucking efficient ensuring it consistently reaches the destination in a pre-defined TAT. This is what we call, “Faster and Better”

6. TheGizmoStar: In terms of comparison with the west how’s trucking different in India?

Mr Praveen Jain: The trucking space in India is highly inefficient as compared to the west. The logistics cost in India as a contribution to GDP is around 14% which in a developed nation is not higher than 8%-9%. The Indian trucking space is highly fragmented and unorganised with ~75% of fleets on road being owned and operated by truck owners owing less than 5 trucks.  In the west adoption of technology in trucking along with better road infrastructure, real time visibility of information across stakeholders, reliability of services and data-based decision making has boasted utilisation of assets and reduced cost making the whole ecosystem highly efficient. Nevertheless many government initiatives like GST, Gati Shakti, Investment in road infrastructure, Digital India amongst many others at macro level and emergence of new age logistics businesses and adoption of tech across industries at macro level are challenging the way India’s whole supply chain eco-system is working and pushing it to undergoing significant transition to bring efficiencies.

7. TheGizmoStar: Five years down the line where do you see Onmove?

Mr Praveen Jain: Five years down the line we believe to be India’s largest trucking network and establish Onmove as a brand in FTL Express logistics space which people associate with trust, reliability, and quality services.