On June 8, Einride Mesh took place for the second time with the theme “Make intelligent moves”. In addition to showcasing the latest digital, electric and autonomous technology for freight mobility, the event – this time in New York City – gathered industry and thought leaders to exchange knowledge and to drive the transportation industry forward. While much has been achieved, there are many exciting challenges yet to come, which is why Mesh was also about inspiring and motivating people to join the team at Einride – where they can amplify their impact by showing the world a new way to move.

At Einride Mesh, the audience heard discussions that shed light on today’s fragmented and far from well functioning transportation industry. The message from everyone was clear – there is an urgent need for change. The good news is that the transformation is already well underway. While the freight industry hasn’t experienced sweeping change since the standardization of the shipping container – in the 1950s – it is now in the midst of three major disruptions; digitalization, electrification, and automation. And Einride is part of leading the charge on all three fronts.

As with all industry transformations, new opportunities open up. At Mesh, attendees were able to meet and engage with some of the faces designing, developing and deploying technologies for freight mobility. They got insight into Einride and a sense of how it would be to join the company and be at the forefront of this transformation. While they were able to see the progress that Einride has made so far, they also got a glimpse at some of the challenges still ahead of us. Challenges that require talented people to overcome them and push boundaries of what is possible.

The summaries below provide an overview of some of the key topics at Mesh geared toward talent. They include the global driver shortage; how to retain and attract talent through technology; the importance of digital intelligence when going electric; and the possibilities AI brings to the industry. 

From shortage to opportunity: Truck drivers see a silver lining in new jobs

Einride employee Tiffany Heathcott is the world’s first remote operator. She joined Mesh together with Steve Viscelli, Associate Professor of Practice at the University of Pennsylvania, to discuss the profession of truck driving. The international driver shortage was dissected both with respect to the root of the problem as well as to the potential solutions – such as how to retain talent in the road freight industry. The panel also explored ways to attract the next generation of truckers, from crafting jobs that meet drivers’ needs and fit their career aspirations to leveraging new technologies in electrification and automation. 

“We are looking at transformative technology here. A truck that can drive itself and can perform twice the number of miles in a day than a human-driven truck can is going to be a fundamental game-changer for trucking,” said Steve. “It’s certainly not going to put millions of drivers out of work. And it’s going to intersect, as all big transformational changes in transportation do, with a number of other factors.” 

“I’m not really concerned about the number of jobs that we have in the near and medium term moving freight. I think we’re going to have far more of them. The question is really: ‘What are those jobs going to look like?’.”

Tiffany shared her experiences and perspectives as a remote operator of Einride’s autonomous vehicles: “What I see with the future of trucking is that it’s going to be more like a pilot where you’re going to be safely monitoring the vehicle as it follows its path. But we’re not spending 14 weeks on the road driving that vehicle. We’re still transporting the same freight that we were transporting before, but we’re doing it in a healthier environment. I don’t think that we’re going to have that big of a job loss in truck drivers; we’re just going to re-train them to do something different in the trucking industry. We’re going to need monitors to monitor the vehicles because Einride has said from the start that we’re never taking the human out of the loop.”

Watch the Mesh session featuring Tiffany Heathcott and Steve Viscelli.

Accelerating sustainability with AI and advanced technology 

Jeff Sternberg – Technical Director, Sustainability at Google Cloud’s Office of the CTO – joined Einride Mesh to talk about artificial intelligence (AI) and share what societal challenges his team is trying to solve with this technology. Together with Einride’s Founding Engineer & SVP Technology, Thomas Ohlson, the two discussed what AI is doing – and what it can do – to support sustainability. Jeff also spoke about Google’s conversational generative artificial intelligence chatbot Bard, the underlying infrastructure technology it brings to the rest of the industry, and how to apply it systematically within businesses in order to drive change.

“2023 is shaping up to be, sort of, the year of AI. For those of you who haven’t been following along, the capabilities of these generative AI models and systems are really pretty astounding, in everything from text to images to video and music, to understanding conversations,” said Jeff. 

Jeff talked about how AI can aid sustainability by helping people make sustainable choices in everyday life, citing Google Maps as a prime example: “What we have done in Google Maps is to add a sustainability lens to the product. It’s a feature called ‘eco-friendly routing’ and what it does is that there is a directions algorithm that ordinarily takes into account traffic, road closures, historical traffic patterns, and things like that. On top of that, we layered an efficiency model – again using AI – to approximate how much fuel or energy would be consumed on the candidate routes that you would take.” 

“What this does is that as long as the overall destination time is the same – the ETA – if there are fuel or energy savings in the route, it will suggest for people to take that route by default. What is interesting is that this adds up. We think that this feature is taking an equivalent of 200 thousand internal combustion engine vehicles off the road, per year,” said Jeff. 

Cut through the noise: You can’t go electric without going digital

Einride’s Chief Product Officer,Ellen Kugelberg, joined Mesh to deep-pe into how digitalization based on Einride Saga's intelligence has allowed the tech company to overcome electrification barriers and cater solutions toward customers’ specific needs. Ellen explained how Einride is leading the way by gathering specialist knowledge across all facets of the electric freight ecosystem. 

“We have expertise in vehicles, batteries, chargers, energy, AI, telematics, UX, logistics, and a lot more; and we connect the data from all these domains. We build out and develop all the different pieces to create the digital infrastructure that will ultimately give us – as well as the entire ecosystem – more efficient transportation. It includes having deep insights of the vehicles, the chargers, driver behaviors, and a lot of other factors that directly affect the performance, like the topography of the route, the climate, the weight of the goods, and so much more,” Ellen tells the audience. 

“We turn this expertise and data into meaningful and actionable insights – both on a strategic level as well as on an operational level. After all, data can be meaningless if you don’t know what to do with it.”

Einride’s CPO then handed the mic to Product ManagerSabina Söderstjerna. Based on real customer data, Sabina conducted live demos of Einride Saga – showing the freight mobility platform’s algorithms and models and how these can benefit shippers.

“Einride is the transformational partner that helps you go electric. Once you are ready to embark on the transition to electric, we will be there to support you at every step along the way, leveraging the latest technologies,” said Sabina.

To learn more about Einride Saga and what was covered during the session, watch the video below or read more here. 

Watch the Mesh session, including a live demo of Einride Saga, conducted by Ellen Kugelberg and Sabina Söderstjerna.

Be part of the change at Einride

At Einride Mesh, attendees got a first-hand glimpse at the digital, electric and autonomous transformation of an industry – a transformation that isn’t on the way; it’s happening. In addition to the live sessions, participants could immerse themselves in Einride’s technology via VR simulations and remote operation experiences. These interactive activities are all about motivating and inspiring people to be part of driving the transformation – from potential clients or partners to future Einride employees.

“If you can see where the next big change is taking off, that can be incredibly inspiring. You kind of need to see it for yourself to believe that it's actually here; it's happening,” said Ellen Kugelberg. “At Einride, we are paving the way. And our mission is to accelerate this change, and to prove what can be done today.”

Einride is always on the lookout for spirited and ambitious people with relevant expertise to help drive this change. Head to the Einride careers page to see our open positions.

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Mesh 2023 is now in the books. Interested in joining us next year? Register your interest in future Mesh events here.