velo[city] Chicago customer event recap

velocity 2024 events

At project44, our core value of Obsess Over the Customer drives us to prioritize their needs and goals in everything we do. Every day we remind ourselves that the products we are building and the services we provide exist to better enhance our customers experience. To that end, earlier this year, we reached a significant milestone in March by hosting the first stop of our customer roadshow series, velo[city], in Atlanta. You can read a recap of that event here.

And this month, we continued our commitment to customer satisfaction by hosting the second velo[city] event in project44’s global headquarter city of Chicago.

Our velo[city] customer roadshow aims to: 

  1. Educate our customers on Movement, our High Velocity Supply Chain Platform, and growing product portfolio, and give them an opportunity to ask questions and see live demos.
  2. Provide a venue for our customers to network with their industry peers, project44 team members, and learn new product use cases.

Customer sessions

Attendees heard a variety of sessions from panels to fireside chats, here’s a quick summary of the highlights:

Photography and Video Production Company Chicago

Bart De Muynck, industry expert and former Gartner analyst, interviewed Kristen Kravitz, VP of Supply Chain at Abercrombie & Fitch, Callie Messer, Head of NA Transportation at Alcon, and Hans Moorlag, Global Logistics at Suntory Global Spirits, who work at vastly different companies but have overcome a similar supply chain challenge using our High-Velocity Supply Chain Platform: lack of visibility. The three agree that project44 has unlocked immense value for their organizations through better carrier accountability, improved end-to-end predictions, and being the partner of choice by leveraging logistics to drive commercial value. Hans concluded by stating, “Movement is a platform for the entire business, not just specific functions,” and Callie agreed, adding, “After integrating project44 with our ERP, it served out customers globally so much better.” 

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Sal Mercogliano, the host of ‘What’s Going On With Shipping’ podcast, gave attendees a masterclass on logistics history. In his session, Sal discussed the “flock of black swan events” that have recently hit the supply chain and where to look for future disruptions. While it’s impossible to predict when a black swan will occur, Sal praised project44 for keeping our customers’ operations afloat during these challenging times. 

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Doug Cantriel, Head of North American Transportation & Modernization at Ford and Rick Turco, Chief Revenue Officer at project44 discussed how Ford optimizes end-to-end visibility and yard operations to reduce costs. Since partnering with project44, Ford has improved productivity and reduced detention costs. Doug attributes these positive results to project44’s onsite presence, enabling a comprehensive understanding of Ford’s business and operations. 

Aaron Hanlon, Head of Customer Engineering – Retail & CPG AI at Google highlighted how Generative AI is transforming Google’s supply chain. Aaron stated, “The dataset that project44 has built is truly unparalleled.” When combined with Google Cloud’s industry-leading multimodal models and scalable AI infrastructure, it will impress both internal and external stakeholders and highlight the overall health of the supply chain. 

Greg Pritchard, Director of Global Logistics at AbbVie, showcased how AbbVie uses visibility to enhance customer experience and build trust. During the Red Sea crisis, the AbbVie team relied on Movement for real-time shipment updates. Through this disruption, Greg learned the importance of collaborating with our Tech team to share what AbbVie needs from Movement and using this data to be more predictive across all operations. 

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Andreas J. Wagner, Chief Strategy Officer at SAP Digital Supply Chain, joined us from Europe to discuss the future of tech innovation in supply chain. project44 is fortunate to collaborate with great partners like SAP on business-critical initiatives such as AI and sustainability. Andreas believes that by working together with carriers, customers, and partners while leveraging AI, we can reduce emissions and create effective standardized measures. 

project44 Innovation Sessions 

Attendees also heard from project44 team members about various projects in motion:   

AJ Wilhoit, our Chief Product Officer, outlined what the Tech team is currently building, including faster implementations, enhanced data quality through project44 AI, new Access Groups to give team members access to only things relevant to them, and streamlined booking processes. 

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Kiruba Raja, General Manager of Facility Automation, highlighted how project44’s Facilities reduce driver detention costs by 10-30%, labor costs by 5-10%, and save 30-45% in time.  

David Deutsch, Vice President of Solutions & Value Engineering, demonstrated how customers can maximize Movement’s value for tangible ROI, advising on optimizing inventory efficiency and sustainability.  Last but not least, Amir Siddiqi, our new Chief Customer Officer, reiterated our commitment to listening to customer feedback and driving success, aiming to increase customers’ revenue, reduce costs, and enhance operational efficiency. 

Unlike events dominated by presentations, we set aside plenty of time for attendees to network, exchange ideas, and share best practices. These sessions included dedicated Product Breakouts on Yard Management, Last Mile, and Domestic and International Visibility. 

Next up, all project44 customers are invited to attend velo[city] virtual on June 25 to hear the latest Movement platform enhancements, and insights into value realization.


The next in-person velo[city] event is in Hamburg, Germany on September 12. Stay tuned for more details on how to register.

Can’t wait and want to learn more about how Movement by project44 can help transform your supply chain operations? Request a demo today.