The Alpega guide to what leaders see next

Transportation is getting harder to manage. Market volatility, labour shortages, rising fuel costs and trade-policy uncertainty are hitting simultaneously. And most organisations are still responding reactively: chasing information, resolving disruptions after they happen, and making decisions with data that arrives too late to be useful. That is not leadership. That is firefighting. According to our latest benchmark research, most of the industry is still there. 

To understand what will separate transportation leaders from the rest over the next three to five years, Alpega and industry analyst Adrian Gonzalez surveyed 56 shippers and 239 carriers and logistics service providers across Europe. 

The results reveal a significant gap between where the industry wants to be and where most companies currently stand. 

A shared vision and a divided reality 

Ask shippers and carriers where transportation is heading and the answers line up. Greater connectivity, more automation, deeper collaboration, data driving decisions at every level. That consensus is consistent across company sizes, sectors and geographies. 

Current capabilities are a different picture. Only 27% of shippers describe themselves as well-integrated with external partners. Only 36% have standardised and automated processes. 50% cite lack of timely or complete data as their single biggest constraint on good decision-making. 

Carriers are further along. 65% say they are well-integrated with external partners. They’ve invested in digitalisation and seen the results. But they face their own version of the same problem: inconsistent, incomplete information coming from the shippers they depend on to execute well. 

Shippers and carriers are both struggling with information flows. Just from opposite ends of the same relationship. That asymmetry is what needs to change. 

The real challenge is between organisations, not inside them 

One theme came through more clearly than any other across both surveys: the most significant challenges in transportation can no longer be solved within a single organisation. They require better coordination, information sharing and trust across entire networks of trading partners. 

68% of shippers named strong collaborative relationships with carriers as the most important future capability. 66% cited network connectivity and integration. 

These are not software features. They are properties of how organisations work together, and they require investment in relationships, shared infrastructure and mutual accountability as much as in technology. 

The organisations that lead will be those that focus as much on how information flows between companies as on how efficiently they manage their own internal processes. 

Five capabilities that define future leaders 

The research identified five areas where leading organisations are already pulling ahead and where the gap with the rest is widening. 

1. Network connectivity and integration 
   Leaders are moving away from managing hundreds of separate carrier connections. Shared transportation networks make collaboration faster and less labour-intensive. The organisations building that infrastructure now are creating an advantage that won't be easy to close. 
   "Transportation leaders will distinguish themselves by becoming fully integrated strategic partners within their customers' supply chains rather than simply service providers." 
   — Carrier, survey respondent 
2. Trusted execution 
   64% of shippers named real-time shipment visibility and consistent performance as the top trust-building capabilities. Trust in transportation is not primarily about relationships or contracts. It is built through consistent delivery, transparent communication when things go wrong, and the ability to resolve problems quickly. Technology helps but it does not replace the discipline of actually doing it well. 
3. Proactive orchestration 
   The difference between leading and lagging organisations comes down to timing. Leaders act before problems escalate. Most organisations are still responding after the damage is done. The tools exist for better visibility, smarter alerting, faster decision-making. The gap is in how quickly organisations are choosing to use them. 
4. AI as an enabler, not the destination 
   AI featured in nearly every qualitative response in the survey, but respondents are not treating it as the goal. They are treating it as the tool for improving visibility, automating routine decisions and freeing teams to focus on what requires human judgement. The point they made consistently: AI is only as good as the data that feeds it. Without clean, connected, timely data, AI investments produce limited returns. 
5. Measurement beyond cost 
   Leaders are redefining what good performance looks like. Cost per shipment remains relevant, but service quality, network resilience, risk exposure and sustainability impact are increasingly the metrics that matter for strategic decision-making. That shift in measurement reflects a deeper shift in priorities: from efficient execution to managing the network as a whole. 

Trust is earned through execution and through verification 

Visibility and reliability are the foundation of trust. But the survey found a gap that sits underneath both. 

Verified partner identity ranked low on both sides: only 34% of shippers and 25% of carriers named it as a priority. In a market where organised freight fraud is accelerating, that is a significant blind spot. 

According to TAPA EMEA, more than 108,000 supply chain theft incidents were recorded across 110 countries in the past two years, with losses exceeding €1 billion. In Germany alone, a full truckload disappears on average every three days. Fraudsters are increasingly impersonating legitimate carriers and getting better at it. 

Knowing how a partner performs is not the same as knowing who they are. 

The gap is real and so is the window 

The benchmark is not comfortable reading for most organisations. Half lack timely data. Less than a third are well-integrated with external partners. Most are still managing transportation reactively in a market that increasingly rewards anticipation. 

But the gap is also an opportunity. The organisations that invest now in connectivity, data quality, trusted execution and proactive orchestration will not just perform better operationally. They will build the network infrastructure that makes every subsequent investment in AI, automation and sustainability more productive. 

The direction is clear: build the data foundation before the AI layer. Invest in the connectivity that makes collaboration real. Measure progress against business outcomes, not technology deployment milestones. Treat partner verification as an operational priority, not a compliance task. 

The benchmark shows clearly what leaders are seeing and doing differently. The question is how quickly the rest of the industry chooses to follow. 

Learn what's slowing most companies down and what leaders see next.