We hosted a lunch prior to the ASCLA awards dinner and invited a number of last-mile experts to attend to network and compare notes. Here's the three biggest trends discussed on the day:
Interest in electric vehicles is accelerating
Many fleet owners have already started EV trials, or are seriously planning to begin a trial in the near future. Some of the operators making waves include FedEx just announcing its Australian EV fleet, Australia Post rolling out electric three-wheelers, Toll Group has a $67 million EV program including adding new EVs for Coles in Western Australia and heavy duty EVs for BlueScope, ANC exceeded it's Project Spark target with 100+ EVs, IKEA just added four EV trucks to their fleet, and earlier this year Centurian added 20 EV trucks to their fleet.
Adding EVs to a fleet can substantially impact routing, shifts, and driver experience. Get Adiona's guide to running a successful EV pilot program to ensure you capture meaningful insights during the program.
The AAA's Electric Vehicle Index is a great resource for seeing the increasing uptake of electric vehicles, including vans and commercial vehicles. Meanwhile, the Electric Vehicle Council's State of Electric Vehicles 2025 report also reveals the Australian national fleet now exceeds 400,000 EVs.
Using network simulation tools to win new customers
A big topic of discussion was from the Adiona customers in attendance at the lunch, who shared step by step how they're using Fleet Simulator to:
- Run simulations on every significant new business opportunity to provide accurate quotes and assess profitability before committing
- Perform network expansion planning, including depots, service regions, purchasing decisions, staffing needs, and financial viability
- Assess customers' delivery patterns to see how they fit within existing operations for efficiency gains or potential conflicts
- Balance holding driver capacity for potential new business against the cost of maintaining unused resources
The great news is you can trial Fleet Simulator free for two weeks, register here to gain access to your own environment to safely test your real requirements and see Adiona's viability for your business first hand.
Challenges in providing high quality last-mile experiences
It's well known that the last-mile is the most complex out of the entire logistics journey, and Australia has its own additional unique challenges. The specific challenges raised included notifications and tracking technology, labour rates and union changes, and the influx of low cost Chinese ecommerce products changing the retail landscape.
On the topic of tracking and notifications, we just released our 2025 State of Delivery Experience report, including a library of real examples of notifications, emails, tracking pages, and more from a variety of delivery providers in Australia, with more examples regularly being added. Check it out!
See the insights from our previous lunch in Sydney and sign up to our newsletter to be notified of the next lunch event.