The state of the freight economy, rise of artificial intelligence (AI), and accelerating levels of fraud across the trucking industry topped the agenda at SMC3 JumpStart26, an annual supply chain education event held in Atlanta earlier this week.JumpStart brings together professionals from across the less-than-truckload (LTL) industry for three days of networking, presentations, and panel discussions on the issues affecting the industry. More than 500 people turned out for the event, which was held at the Renaissance Atlanta Waverly, January 26-28.The freight economy continues to be marked by uncertainty, despite some bright spots on the broader economic horizon, according to economist Keith Prather of Armada Corporate Intelligence, who gave an economic update on the first day of the conference. Prather cited consumer spending on services rather than goods, tariff volatility, and an unhealthy housing market as persistent drags on the freight economy. Bright spots include anticipated tax refunds that may boost consumer spending on goods later this year, a slowly improving residential construction market that could help spur freight movement, and strong GPD growth heading into 2026.Touting AIAI dominated much of the discussion over the three days, with LTL freight carriers, third-party logistics services (3PL) providers, and technology companies detailing how the technology can be used to improve operations within companies and across the industry. Speakers included Mark Albrecht, vice president of artificial intelligence and enterprise strategy at 3PL C.H. Robinson.Albrecht’s talk coincided with the company’s launch of AI agents aimed at combatting missed LTL pickups. Two new AI agents…
