Transportation and logistics company Schneider has joined the Blockchain in Transport Alliance (BITA) to collaborate on the development of blockchain standards and education for the freight industry.

Formed in August 2017, BiTA aims to promote the adoption, education, and development of a standard framework around blockchain in the freight industry. It counts over 200 freight transportation companies as its members which includes the likes of FedEx, SAP, UPS, and Salesforce, among others.

As a BiTA member, Schneider will collaborate with several North American companies committed to the real-world execution of blockchain solutions in logistics and supply chains.

“There’s significant potential for blockchain technology across the transportation and logistics service ecosystem with the ability to streamline transfer of data and time across all participants in the complex supply chain process,” said Shaleen Devgun, CIO and executive vice president at Schneider. “The ability to use Blockchain technology to communicate with customers, suppliers, carriers, financial institutions and consumers can foster breakthrough efficiency in the supply chain process.”

In its official release, Schneider said that a blockchain-based event management network can power its wide-range portfolio of services to securely share data and enable order visibility, transaction verification and payment automation. Customers could benefit from an increase in transparency of shipments, a full auditability of activities, automated payments using smart contracts, and real-time chain of custody auditing.