Just as every manufacturer and retailer is having to extend its business operations around the world, the less-than-truckload industry is devising new ways to make itself a valuable member of customers' global chains.

As in 2006, GL&SCS this year partnered with Aberdeen Group, Boston, to conduct a comprehensive technology survey of a cross-section of our readership. The purpose was to assess corporate spending plans and priorities for supply chain technology and to see how these plans differ among innovators, best-in class, and average performers. The results, summarized below and in a soon-to-be-published Aberdeen report, should help companies benchmark their own technology road maps.

A growing number of logistics service providers are offering to host the software needed to manage logistics. And their clients are warming to the idea.

A conversation with Mohan Balachandran , vice president-consumer industries, at i2 Technologies, Dallas.