Sector IND 04
Logistics and supply chain
Logistics and supply chain work, as Blueharbour does it, is engineering for the messages that move goods: orders, bookings, status events and invoices passing between shippers, carriers, warehouses and customs brokers. We design for the exceptions, the late, malformed or missing message, because the normal path already works and the exceptions are where shipments stop.
Who this is for
CTOs, heads of IT and operations leads at forwarders, third-party logistics providers, carriers and shippers that run their own integrations with many partners over EDI, APIs or file drops. It fits when the integrations exist and the pain is a queue of failures someone clears by hand. It does not fit a company choosing a new transport or warehouse management system.
Problems you will recognise
- 01
A carrier changes a field format overnight, and bookings fail without an error until a customer calls about a missed pickup.
- 02
Failed messages arrive in a shared mailbox, and nobody can tell which of them have already been fixed.
- 03
A partner sends the same status event twice, and your system invoices the customer twice.
- 04
Customs data for one lane still comes from a spreadsheet macro on one person's laptop.
European regulation · a condition, not a sector
The regulatory condition
The NIS2 directive, directive (EU) 2022/2555, lists transport among the sectors it covers and sets cybersecurity risk management and incident reporting duties for entities that fall in scope under national law. Scope depends on size, activity and the member state. This is general information, not legal advice. Whether and how it applies to your company is a question for your own counsel. Our work produces the system inventory and incident records that assessment needs.
What we do here
Managed services
Integrations fail at night and at weekends, and monitoring decides how long a failure goes unseen.
AI engineering and automation
Routing an exception to the right person with its context attached is an automation with clear rules.
Web and product engineering
Every partner connection is an integration with its own format and its own ways to fail.
Cloud, data and modernisation
Moving off old message brokers and spreadsheets is where most recurring exceptions are retired.
Security and compliance readiness
An operator in scope needs a written control picture and changes that leave a record.
A shipment flow with its exception branch
The normal path runs down the left. When a message fails a check, it leaves the path into a queue that a named person works, with the original message attached, and rejoins once fixed.
Read as a list
- 01
Order. The order arrives from the shipper's system.
- 02
Booking. A booking goes to the carrier in the carrier's format.
- 03
Carrier event. Status events come back; each is checked for format, order and duplicates.
- 04
Status update. The customer sees the shipment status.
- 05
Invoice. The invoice is raised once per shipment, never per message.
- →
Person. A failed event lands in a queue with the original message, the reason it failed and an owner, who fixes it or asks the partner.
A first engagement
- 01
List the exceptions
Exists afterA list of one month of failed messages on one partner lane, grouped by cause.
- 02
Pick the largest cause
Exists afterOne cause chosen with your operations lead, and the rule that should have caught it.
- 03
Route it to a person
Exists afterFailed messages of that cause land in a queue with the original message, the reason and an owner.
- 04
Close the loop
Exists afterA fix or a written request to the partner, and an alert if the cause returns.
Questions about this sector
- Do you work with EDI or only with modern APIs?
- Both. Many lanes still run on EDIFACT, X12 or flat files over SFTP, and we treat them as real integrations, with tests and monitoring like any API.
- Should every exception be automated away?
- No. Some need a person's judgement, such as a damaged shipment or a customs hold. We automate the routing and the context so that person spends the time deciding, not searching.
- Do you replace our TMS or WMS?
- No. We work around the transport and warehouse systems you already run, through their APIs, exports or EDI feeds. Replacing a core system is a separate decision, and we scope it only if you ask.
Name the problem you see this week
Write a few lines about one problem from your own systems. We reply with the questions we would ask first.
An email exchange first, no call needed.