Modern technology has completely evolved the way businesses plan, design, build, and execute supply chain and transportation systems. New and compelling advancements have shaken up the foundation of the transportation industry. In addition, new entrants such as Uber Freight and Amazon are pushing the envelope of an already crowded space. However, looking at the current market scenario, the race to the top will be won, not by the industry giants oftentimes too bloated for genuine improvements, but rather, by smaller, more adaptive and innovative companies. One such company is MGN Logistics, headquartered in Easton, Pennsylvania.
Matthew Telesca is the President & CEO of MGN Logistics, Inc. MGN was one of the first companies in the transportation space to launch a fully automated freight marketplace online called “logisticsquote.com”. Established in 2000, the company was an early adopter of web-based technology and after its exponential user growth, the website was sold to a group of private equity investors just four years later, in 2004. After its initial success, the company continued innovating online, as well as, creating a brick and mortar presence; and by 2007, MGN had acquired the first, of what would be, multiple freight management companies. That same year, the company launched a new and radically adaptive Transportation Management System (TMS). Under the leadership and guidance of Telesca, the company continued to develop creative transportation modules, which included predictive pricing, extensive KPI charting and intelligent transportation routing, outpacing all other major players in the space with a focus on cutting edge technology.
It was from early childhood, Telesca was inclined towards business and finance. To manage his school payments and shoulder family responsibilities, he started working at a warehouse, loading and unloading trucks. During a major crisis at work, Telesca found himself in need of carriers that would dispatch critical shipments within 24 hours. Before the era of Google and Amazon, few trucking companies had websites or could be searched online. With no other option in sight, Telesca referred to the yellow pages and found a local carrier that would perform the deliveries within the stipulated time, and at a substantially cheaper rate. Immediately, he recognized a business opportunity had presented itself. Ten months, countless sleepless nights, and two-hundred fifty thousand lines of code later and a new website called “logisticsquote.com” was launched. It was one of the first fully automated freight transportation websites, where customers could easily set up accounts, receive shipping rates instantly, create shipping documents and track their freight online.
Today, the company operates from 6 locations, spanning Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Florida, Michigan and the Dominican Republic. While MGN Logistics can provide services as a traditional freight broker, its focus and specialization is as a full-service freight management partner. Their proprietary TMS is cloud-based and powerful enough for large corporations, while still easy to use and integrate even with small businesses. The company’s suite of services includes price and service optimization, carrier routing, e-dispatching along with fully automated documentation creation, pre and post-audit, freight payment and an extensive suite of interactive business intelligence charts and KPIs.
Expert Team Players
During the initial days of MGN Logistics, with no money to spare, Telesca did it all; from idea development, to programming, to the vendor creation, to the invoicing and billing, to tracking and tracing, everything. So, when the business began to grow, and he needed to hire employees, it was difficult to let go and delegate those responsibilities to others. However, once he started handing the responsibilities to his employees, and they started to take ownership, it sparked a never-ending process of improvement, which even today, is a central part of the company. Today, MGN Logistics has a group of highly disciplined, effective executives, that not only share Telesca’s vision of the company, but also are able to execute the same.
List of Solutions
MGN Logistics offers the following solutions for customers;
- Business Intelligence
- Freight Management
- Load Optimization
- Carrier Optimization
- Embedded Analytics
- Carrier Rating
- Invoice Pre and Post Audits
- Carrier Payment
Future Plans for MGN Logistics
Part of Telesca’s growth strategy for MGN has been to make a series of small strategic acquisitions. These acquisitions have been varied in purpose, some to grow the customer base, while other acquisitions were more focused on obtaining certain technology or individual talents. This strategy has proven successful for the expansion of the company as MGN has been recognized by Inc Magazine as one of America’s fastest growing private companies, four years in a row, with the most recent in 2017. Interestingly, one of the biggest challenges faced in the transportation industry, is the necessity of trust in so many supply chain transactions. Brokers must trust that a carrier is who they say they are, carriers must trust they will get paid, shippers must trust that a carrier will not double-broker a load, and so on and so forth. MGN Logistics has always been on the cutting edge of these types of transformational changes, beginning from their early arrival on the internet, to their development of a real-time truckload pricing app, to their latest design and development of the industry’s first blockchain enhanced TMS. As the CEO and visionary of the company, Telesca has been excited to see, not only the changes in the transportation space, but also be an integral part of those changes.
Word of Wisdom for the Budding Entrepreneurs
Telesca suggests the younger generation of entrepreneurs to possess grit, discipline and the ability to keep grinding through good and bad times. Further, he adds that “a budding entrepreneur must be prepared to work above and beyond everyone else. Hard work, passion and drive are the necessary building blocks of creating a successful business.”
