It was our final couple of days in Stockholm, and besides our business visits to Einride and Megadeals, we got some free time to explore. We definitely took advantage of this time, getting a lot of shopping in and taking a quick but informative boat tour.
Einride
We finished our first week of Scandinavian business visits with Einride, a company that helps produce electric trucks using AI. Like so many other Swedish businesses, one of their main goals is sustainability, both economically and environmentally. One of the words they used to describe their reasons and processes is “ecosystem’”. This was not the first time I heard that word during a business visit. Swedish businesses like to look at themselves as part of a whole or ecosystem which includes other people, business, and the environment. Being environmentally friendly is a goal that every company we have visited so far has had, and Einride is no exception.
Einride was started to solve both a logistics and environmental problem. Currently there is a shortage of truckers, and that is expected to double in the next five years. Also, there is an underutilization average of 11% of freight worldwide. Not to mention that 7% of the CO2e emissions are caused by the trucking industry. Einride assists other companies in solving these problems by giving companies all the tools they need to go autonomous and electric.
Einride made it very clear that they are not a trucking company. They are a tech and software company that niche in and provide all the software to help coordinate all aspects of the freight ecosystem. At the center of the ecosystem that Einride created is an AI operating system called Saga. Einride stressed that Saga helps get rid of drivers but not monitoring.
The future looks promising for Einride. Europe is expanding carbon pricing in 2027, and more cities are promising to go carbon neutral in the coming years. Einride trucks would be a great asset to those cities and companies who now must follow stricter environmental regulations because Einride trucks are carbon neutral. Companies will also benefit from Einride’s software because they will not struggle to find truckers in the upcoming shortage.
Despite all of this good news, Einride does face some challenges. Many companies are finding it difficult to transition to a new system. As the presentation at the university said, many businesses and people are uncertain of AI and are slow to adopt it. So many companies are staying with the legacy systems instead. That along with the slow speed of digitalization is causing some issues for Einride. However, digitalization is one of the many areas that Sweden excels at and is working to improve, so maybe Einride will be able to overcome that hurdle soon.
What Went Wrong
Now on to our mishaps! We had plenty of time Friday afternoon to do some much-needed laundry. We researched a laundromat, got an Uber, and were on our way when we realized that the laundromat was actually a dry cleaner. We decided to just turn around and go back to the hotel where we would use their laundry service. Sadly, the earliest they could give us our laundry back was Monday morning and we left Sunday, so we were unable to do that. We were forced to make do with handwashing our clothes in the sink.
Unfortunately we don’t have any relevant pictures to go along with the blog this time, so enjoy this picture of a really cute dog we met!
