A.P. Moller – Maersk (Maersk) and Kodiak Robotics, Inc., have launched the first commercial autonomous trucking lane between Houston and Oklahoma City.
The freight lane marks an expansion of Kodiak and Maersk’s relationship, which began with their first autonomous freight deliveries together in November 2022 as part of Maersk’s Global Innovation Centre Programme.
Kodiak has been delivering eight cargoes per week for Maersk clients with a safety driver since August.
Kodiak and Maersk make four round journeys each week, 24 hours a day, four days a week, between a Houston plant where consumer items are loaded onto 53-foot trailers and an Oklahoma City distribution centre.
Maersk’s collaboration with Kodiak allows it to remain at the forefront of creative solutions. Maersk believes that autonomous trucks will be critical in digitising the supply chain.
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The operational learnings collected from the activity are captured and documented as part of the Kodiak Partner Deployment Programme, which is aimed to help firms learn how to integrate Kodiak’s self-driving trucks into their entire logistics strategy and offers.
According to the American Trucking Association, the trucking sector is facing a driver shortage of around 78,000 people.
Each Kodiak vehicle is equipped with 18 different sensors, including cameras, radar, and lidar, that provide the platform with a 360-degree view around the truck.
Every tenth of a second, the truck evaluates the performance of more than 1,000 safety-critical processes and components in both the self-driving stack and the underlying truck platform.
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Erez Agmoni, Maersk’s Global Head of Innovation – Logistics & Services, said: “Teaming with Kodiak enables Maersk to stay at the forefront of innovative solutions. Autonomous trucks will play an instrumental role in digitising the supply chain.
“We expect self-driving trucks to ultimately become a competitive advantage for Maersk as we execute on our strategy to provide customers with a sustainable, end-to-end logistics solution across air, land, and sea.”
Don Burnette, Founder and CEO, Kodiak, stated: “Since our founding, we have focused on developing an autonomous product that is easy for global innovation leaders to integrate into their networks, and Maersk is a perfect fit.
“As the first autonomous trucking company to establish this new commercial lane between Houston and Oklahoma City, we are demonstrating our team’s ability to introduce new lanes and bring new efficiencies to the entire logistics industry.”
In September, Maersk conducted two pilots to provide electric truck capabilities to customers in Brazil.
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