Shippers have more transportation data than ever, but having data and knowing what to do with it are two very different things.
Tender activity, carrier acceptance, rates, volume, market conditions and routing guide performance often live across different systems and are analyzed separately. That can make it difficult to see where a network is performing well, where risk is building and where there may be an opportunity to reduce cost.
That is what SCI: Custom Insights is designed to solve.
SCI: Custom Insights is a new consortium-powered experience within SONAR’s Supply Chain Intelligence that combines a shipper’s transportation data with SONAR market benchmarks to provide an ongoing view of network performance.
Available to participating members of the SONAR Shipper Consortium, Custom Insights helps shippers move from high-level network health to individual markets, lanes and carriers to better understand where action may be needed.
From transportation data to network intelligence
Participating shippers contribute transportation data that can include tendered volume, accepted and rejected tenders, carrier information, rates and other network activity.
SCI: Custom Insights brings that data together with SONAR market intelligence so users can answer questions such as:
- Where are we paying above or below market?
- Which lanes are creating the greatest savings opportunity?
- Where could pricing be creating capacity or service risk?
- Are carriers accepting the freight we expected them to?
- Is actual volume aligning with planned or awarded volume?
- Which markets are driving network cost or risk?
- Which carriers or lanes should we evaluate first?
Instead of reviewing those questions independently, Custom Insights connects them across three primary areas: Network Health, Benchmarking and Network Optimization.
Network Health: See the bigger picture
Network Health is the starting point for SCI: Custom Insights and provides an executive-level view of the transportation network.
Users can quickly review key metrics including:
- Total transportation spend
- Market vs. actual spend
- Savings opportunities
- At-risk spend
- Total volume
- Network risk
- Tender compliance
- Pricing alignment
- Budget and volume trends
The page also incorporates SONAR market context and AI-driven insights around volume demand, rates and capacity.
The goal is simple: help users quickly understand what is changing across the network and where they should look next.
Benchmarking: Find the lanes that need attention
Benchmarking takes the analysis from the network level down to individual lanes.
Lane Opportunities
Lane Opportunities combines pricing alignment, lane difficulty, tender acceptance and market conditions to classify lanes into four areas:
- High Risk Zone
- Savings Opportunity
- Carrier-Dependent Zone
- Efficiency Zone
This helps users identify lanes where they may be overpaying, lanes where aggressive pricing could be creating service exposure and areas where both pricing and capacity are performing well.
Volume Compliance
Volume Compliance compares planned volume with actual volume so shippers can see where freight is surging, falling short or moving differently than expected.
Users can then evaluate pricing, acceptance and carrier performance alongside those volume changes.
This provides important context for procurement and routing guide conversations. A carrier performance issue may look very different if the carrier received significantly more freight than planned, just as a pricing decision may need to be reconsidered if actual volume never materialized.
Network Optimization: Understand the markets and carriers driving performance
Network Optimization helps users understand what is behind broader network results.
Network Analysis
Network Analysis groups transportation activity by origin or destination market.
Users can evaluate spend, volume, rate alignment, tender rejection conditions and compliance across their facilities and markets, then drill into the lanes driving those results.
This makes it easier to identify whether an issue is isolated to a single lane or part of a broader market or network trend.
Carrier Intelligence
Carrier Intelligence provides a network-wide view of carrier performance using metrics such as:
- Carrier average rate
- Rate variance
- Tender acceptance
- Total volume
- Total lanes
- Average length of haul
- Risk level
- Guidance
Users can then drill into an individual carrier to see exactly which lanes are driving its performance.
The result is a clearer picture of where carrier relationships are supporting the network and where additional evaluation may be needed.
Manual Analysis
SCI: Custom Insights does not replace the existing Supply Chain Intelligence workflow.
The original SCI experience is now available under Manual Analysis and remains an important part of the platform.
Shippers can continue using Manual Analysis for:
- Mini-bids
- Project freight
- Scenario analysis
- New lanes
- Freight that is not yet part of their ongoing consortium data
This gives participating shippers both an ongoing view of their existing transportation network and the ability to perform one-off analysis when needed.
Built for the SONAR Shipper Consortium
SCI: Custom Insights is available exclusively to participating members of the SONAR Shipper Consortium.
By contributing transportation data, members gain access to deeper network intelligence designed to support procurement, carrier management, routing guide strategy and transportation planning.
The value goes beyond simply seeing more metrics. It is about connecting shipper-specific performance with market context so teams can identify what matters and decide where to act.
Find the savings, surface the risk and know where to act next with SCI: Custom Insights.
Interested in joining the SONAR Shipper Consortium or learning more about SCI: Custom Insights? Email bd@gosonar.com for more information.
