Artificial intelligence (AI) is changing the way freight moves, and FreightWaves has honored 10 companies leading that transformation with its first-ever AI Excellence in Supply Chain Awards. Among them was C.H. Robinson—the only third-party logistics provider recognized—for innovations that are helping the industry reach new levels of efficiency, visibility, and automation.
The company stood out for deploying more than 30 generative AI agents that have performed millions of shipping tasks, from quoting and order processing to capacity acquisition, appointment scheduling, and shipment tracking. The results have been striking: millions of shipping tasks performed, and productivity up 35%. That means faster responses for shippers, better carrier matches, and more resilient supply chains.
For C.H. Robinson, the award is not just a recognition of recent innovation, but a milestone in a journey that began more than a decade ago. The company’s AI story starts long before generative AI became a headline, with early investments in machine learning and algorithms that steadily redefined how freight could move around the world.
Where it began: building the foundation
Years before “digital brokerage” became an industry buzzword, C.H. Robinson was using AI to match freight with carriers faster and more accurately, pioneering early freight-matching capabilities more than a decade ago.
In 2018, the company launched its Optimizer tool, which uses AI to select the right route, right mode, right carrier, and right day for a shipment, saving customers an average of 8% in transportation costs—and in some cases as much as 30%.
The company also developed predictive ETA accuracy of 98.2%—helping customers hit on-time delivery targets and avoid costly penalties and was the first in the industry to create touchless appointment scheduling.
These advances laid the groundwork for what would come next: a new generation of AI capable not only of analyzing information, but of taking action.
Breaking barriers with generative and agentic AI
The turning point came in 2023, when generative AI opened the door to overcoming automation challenges that had persisted for decades. C.H. Robinson began developing AI agents to automate individual logistics tasks spanning the entire lifecycle of a shipment including: quoting, order processing, capacity acquisition, appointment scheduling, shipment tracking, and more.
What is agentic AI?
Agentic AI builds on generative AI by moving from understanding information to acting on it—making decisions, performing multi-step tasks, and collaborating with other agents or humans to complete complex workflows.
Today, the company’s fleet of AI agents stands at more than 30, and even includes AI agents that assist other AI agents. One of the most impactful is the order agent, created to turn booking requests into ready-to-move shipments in minutes. It pulls details from emails, attachments, and subject lines; fills in missing information; determines the best shipping mode; and can even decide how commodities should be palletized.
Previously, such a request might sit in a queue for hours before a person began manual entry. Now, the process is finished in about 90 seconds, whether for a single load or 20. At scale, that’s 5,500 orders per day and more than 600 hours saved daily.
For shippers, faster processing means quicker carrier matching, more competitive rates, and better pickup and delivery windows—advantages that directly impact cost and service in a competitive market.
The road ahead
For C.H. Robinson, the maturity of its AI models is a testament to its leadership in the space —and the evolution continues, building from traditional AI, generative AI, and agentic AI to deliver even greater benefits for customers, carriers, and employees.
With AI agents deployed across the network, and growing more capable every day thanks to C.H. Robinson’s unmatched scale and data advantage, the next chapter is about supercharging logistics experts and augmenting their capabilities even further. With improved efficiency and increased productivity, the goal remains the same: pushing the boundaries of logistics innovation and addressing the most complex supply chain challenges.
From the first freight-matching algorithms to today’s always-on fleet of AI agents, the journey has been one of constant innovation. And if the past decade is any indication, the future of AI in supply chains is only just beginning.