Eden Prairie’s C.H. Robinson, a logistics stalwart, disrupting industry with AI

C.H. Robinson, one of the world’s largest logistics providers, has gone from disrupted to disruptor.

Five to 10 years ago, the Eden Prairie-based company was facing an existential threat from digital startups in the logistics space.

Firms like Uber Freight and Conroy Logistics believed they could digitize the processes of connecting shippers and suppliers. Investors were betting on them to be the next big thing, but the companies found logistics is a lot more complicated than the ride-hailing business.

Meanwhile, C.H. Robinson is now outpacing the rest of the logistics industry, including digital startups, by transforming its business through AI agents and lean management techniques.

The transformation began with a cultural shift Dave Bozeman enacted after he became CEO in 2023.

Bozeman began with optimizing efficiency to help drive faster, more effective change.

“Our people, our technology and our operating model, those three together are driving this company different in an industry that’s under pressure,” Bozeman said in an interview.

During that time, C.H. Robinson also has experienced ups and downs, but it has steadily gained market share as it bet heavily on artificial intelligence.

“We don’t use the macroenvironment as an excuse,” Bozeman told analysts on the company’s recent third quarter earnings call. “We are a fundamentally different company than we were two years ago, illustrated by the company’s consistent outperformance vs. the market.”

C.H. Robinson is one of Minnesota’s hidden tech centers. It has about 800 technologists across the company, and their skills have helped C.H. Robinson outpace the rest of the logistics industry in the adoption of AI.

“Companies in every industry are under increasing pressure to adopt AI or get left behind,” said Arun Rajan, the company’s chief strategy and innovation officer, in C.H. Robinson’s latest AI announcement.

Today, AI agents perform more than 3 million shipping tasks, and the time to complete tasks have significantly shrunk. An emailed order once took four hours to process. Now an AI agent can process that order in 90 seconds.

“The company continues an impressive demonstration of actually leveraging AI to drive meaningful efficiency and earnings gains,” wrote Brandon Oglenski, an analyst with Barclays, in a research note on Robinson’s third quarter results.

At an annual customer event in October, C.H. Robinson made its largest AI introduction yet.

C.H. Robinson’s Always-On Logistics Planner includes a suite of more than 30 AI agents used from beginning to end on order-processing, including reading and sorting customer emails, setting appointments, classifying freight and tracking shipments as well as other tasks.

The company said the AI agents have increased productivity, allowing employees to process 40% more shipments per person per day.

“AI applications have scaled considerably at CHRW,” wrote Jason Seidl, an analyst with TD Cowen, in recent research note. “Productivity improvements are already apparent to management and, we believe, visible in results.”

Robinson’s AI solutions also benefited from leading technology in the industry, including C.H. Robinson’s Navisphere, which was already one of the most-connected platforms in the third party logistics space.

That means the company can rely more on its own talent than outside consultants, saving both money and time.

Bozeman said there are no workforce reduction goals tied to AI, but total employment has gone down as AI is replacing some of the time-consuming, repetitive operation roles.

But he said AI is also augmenting the work of C.H. Robinson employees so they can focus more on customer service and the more challenging logistics solutions along with increasing the skill sets of others.

The company is concentrating on hiring new tech talent and also more customer-facing roles. It’s also looking for people who embrace technology but still have that customer service mindset.

Bozeman said there’s more innovation to come. He categorizes the company’s North American surface transportation segment as being in the third inning of its evolution and the global forwarding segment to be in the first inning.