After just six months of project work starting in March 2019, skypooling use the ULD CARE Annual Conference in Montréal to officially launch their www.skypooling.com website: a ULD-sharing platform*.

“skypooling was already ahead of the game – and this latest update and new features will continue to make this the #1 ULD tool.” Christine Klemmer, General Manager of skypooling, is
delighted with the positive customer reactions to the completely revised version 2.0 – and she has every reason to be. Over the past months, she and her team have been hard at work incorporating
solutions resulting from a comprehensive user survey carried out amongst the 100+ users from around 60 airlines who were already using the first version.

Finding the perfect match…
Together with Jettainer GmbH and syngenio AG, they have seen the project develop from a mass of post-it notes and flipcharts, through to dummy prototypes and on to functional test versions. She
and her team, all present at the skypooling stand at the Montréal conference, had worked on the project in addition to their “normal, day jobs” – a labor of love, therefore – so the claim on the
corporate skypooling polo shirts they are wearing today: “a dating platform for ULDs”, is not that far off the mark. And “dating” is what they encouraged the conference attendees to do, too.
Delegates, split into either the Blue airline or the Orange airline (roughly complementing skypooling’s corporate colors), were sent on a mission to find a partner offering or willing to take
what they were missing/providing: in other words, whose ULD or pallet overstock matched their ULD/pallet understock – and vice versa. CFG, who placed a request for 8 AKEs in HKG soon found a
“match” with a delegate from Atlas Air, who happened to have what she was looking for. The point of the “dating game”? Firstly, to show delegates how simple and user-friendly the new interface
is, and secondly, to give them a chance to win a coveted orange or blue Bluetooth speaker. CFG remains hopeful of becoming a winner…

What’s so great about skypooling 2.0?
So, what are the functions that make skypooling so attractive? For starters, the user-friendly design. skypooling has come a long way from its origins as a basic excel-table and now offers a
state-of-the-art interface in clean white, yellow and blue, which is extremely simple to use.
Where, in the past, users had to scroll through excel lists of stations and equipment to find a possible match, the system now very quickly automatically matches airlines with similar over- and
understock: a huge timesaving compared to before. The color-coded overview makes it easy on the eye to spot matches. 
Transparent communication is also a great bonus. Whereas in the past, communication took place outside the system in a string of emails between the respective parties at each airline, now all
communication can be done inside the system. Information exchange and agreements are carried out in a secure area, all in one place, with easy access to references in case of issues at a later
stage. In addition to enquiries and coordination administration, users can also make bookings directly in the platform.
It goes without saying that the new functions are now also available via smartphone or tablet – thus the system is completely mobile – globally and around the clock. Martin
Kraemer, Head of Marketing & PR for skypooling, sees huge potential: “skypooling’s new design and additional features are just the first step among many more to improve the
platform and its services to become the leading place for ULD sharing.”

Why share?
Sharing is caring! In this case, also for the environment: just a single standard AKE container not having to fly empty back to its origin, saves an average of 65 kgs of CO². Not having to send a
pallet stack is a saving of roughly 3,000 kgs. Empty ULDs and pallets should be avoided as much as possible, and the sharing principle offered through skypooling allows better use of available
ULD and aircraft capacities, cutting down on deadhead moves and having to store empty ULDs.
Christine Klemmer is certain that the new system will significantly simplify the work of many ULD controllers and is proud of its positive environmental side-effect: “In
future, there will be many more solutions to find on the platform that will make ULD sharing even more easy and comfortable. skypooling therefore will become an essential work tool for many ULD
controllers and will help them to save time, effort and costs. Due to the avoidance of empty runs, the CO2 balance of the airlines will improve as well.”
The end of the project heralds the start of the launch, and that means that the next few days will see skypooling migrate all their customers and their data to the new platform. Current users
will be proactively informed of their migration and do not need to register on the new platform, which remains fully accessible during the migration process.
Interested in seeing the new skypooling platform for yourself? Check out: https://youtu.be/kmp9ECg7CCU And if you like what you see but are not yet a user, simply register on www.skypooling.com to soon get access to the several
thousands of ULDs on offer each week!

Brigitte Gledhill

*skypooling

skypooling is a tool that helps participating airlines in dealing with container and pallet movements more efficiently. It is not a replacement for ULD management, rather it is a tool for
airlines with critical, short-term over or underloads. (Airlines with ULD management do not usually have this problem, since they actively steer their ULDs.) It is therefore a tool used by
airline ULD controllers to solve problem scenarios. The airline enters information about ULD understocks or overstocks and connects with other airlines who have matching requirements. This helps
to balance container inventories, ensuring benefits and savings for all participants. It is often the case that not enough ULD or loading capacities are available or ULDs and flights are not
fully utilized. skypooling enables a simple exchange of this information and brings parties together who would otherwise not have found each other. By transporting less empty ULDs, airlines
benefit from additional freight revenue, cost and fuel savings as well as lower CO2 emissions, which in turn are good for the environment.