Discl: Held IRL 3.66% and in SM

Nice ... average cost of $49.95. A fair few more zeros that what I would be deploying to top up WTC, thats for sure!

That tipping over $1m also suggests that there could be some element of management confidence building involved.

But there is no taking away that it is a good show of confidence in the future.

Discl: Held IRL 3.49%

FWIW, a different AI perspective from the "Future of SAAS Companies" thread, unique to WTC, hence the posting under WTC.

Context

Caught up with a mate of mine who owns an International Cargo company in Europe. They do, for B2B customers, the end-to-end of road, sea, air and rail transport worldwide. 30+ employees.

He is a Cargowise customer and Cargowise is deeply embedded in his operations.

He is an ex-IT change consultant, not a tech head, but knows his way around technical things, so was chatting with him with that shared context of systems change management. He will be significantly more Enterprise IT experienced than the average joe and is likely to be at the front end of the pack trying out new AI capabilities rather than being a technology adopting laggard.

AI Comments

Some AI-related data points from the perspective of a smallish Cargowise customer - my questions in italics, responses in bullets

With all these developments in AI LLM’s, would you ever consider using AI to build your own thing to either remove entirely or reduce your Cargowise subscription?

• At this stage there is no way to remove Cargowise but you can use AI to support using Cargowise
• You would need to consider many factors and business risk is too high. Maybe for a small company, yes. I do not see big players going for it
• AI error prevention when handling shipments, testing, etc

But as Cargowise is integral to your business, will you ever DIY to try to replace it completely? I can’t see the logic of doing that ever because you exist to ship things, not to code and manage software ... And coding is easy, deploying and maintaining it thy kingdom come is another matter entirely.

• Correct. I would not invest in AI. I would just use Cargowise unless there is a new solution based on AI that I can use
• in house - nope
• I am developing AI bots now to support workflows, but Cargowise is in the core
• Cargowise is my DB too for all shipments, finance, AR, AP, etc. Reporting
• I have add ons to analyse - to make it digestable

So you would only ever build capabilities AROUND Cargowise but never to replace it?

• It is an industry standard, not perfect like a democracy, but nobody [has developed] sic anything better for now
• Yes not at this stage, Cost is acceptable

What would force you to think about DIY’ing. 

• It is like a steam ship or propeller plane - but I am doing stuff around to speed things up
• Cost would be the only factor
• For me functionality is ok, It looks shit, but it works
• It looks shit, because it grew organically, it is death by clicking

MY TAKEAWAYS

1. “Imperfect industry standard”, but it works - that should make Cargowise that much stickier than enterprise software which is only used by an enterprise

2. Can’t see vibe-coding to REPLACE Cargowise, but is absolutely using AI to speed things up around Cargowise - business risk is too high

3. “Cost is acceptable” was an interesting comment - if WTC do not overdo the cost increases, there does not appear to be any incentive to consider something else

4. Cargowise is the DB for shipments, finance, AR, AP, Reporting - speaks to the point well made that AI will make building out these adjacent capabilities a lot easier - the broader the adjacencies, the broader the Cargowise footprint, the more locked in the customer becomes

1 customer's experience does not mean everyone else feels the same way. But given his IT background, it provided for me, some useful insights from a customer who is likely to be at the front of the pack of pushing the boundaries of AI as it relates to WTC. It also helps validate my thinking that WTC will more likely thrive in an AI world, rather than be eaten by it.

I love the AFR. But its recent "go for his nuts" approach to playing the man, not the ball (pun sort of intended ..) is starting to get to me a bit once the initial public service of raising unseen/unknown red flags outlives its usefulness. In my view, the relentless desire to find ANY fault with every and anything starts to dilute the importance of investigative journaling. I am feeling this way the more I read Joe Aston's book on Qantas, for example - it has got way, way too personal vs Joyce.

Unless of course, there is an angle to the announcement which I haven't quite seen, hence this post/question.

This was an extract of the AFR's take on the WTC announcement on Fri where Maree Isaacs sold a chunk of her shares to Richard with a somewhat funky deal stretching out 7 years.

I read the announcement and my immediate reaction was (1) good for Maree (2) Richard is committing himself to more holdings and a somewhat orderly drawdown vs flooding the market or selling a block to another investor who could cause turbulence in the WTC book (3) how Richard pays Maree is a matter for him/them. This is, for all intents and purposes, no different from how one fund sells a block to another fund and deals with the funding/settlement issue - the Board notes the change in shareholding, however the deal is structured, and everyone moves on.

So this AFR take surprised me. I am wondering why, as a shareholder, should I be concerned with this, beyond the above. Its a shareholder to shareholder sale, no doubt both are insiders. But it is still a matter for them and I can't quite see how the Board should be concerned with this. The fact that the numbers are big does not change it for me. Is the AFR, or specifically, Mark di Stefano, trying to make news where there is none to be made?

Wondering what everyone's take on this is and if I am missing something blatantly obvious here. Am doing this to try to sharpen my read of these sorts of announcements, particularly after the recent spate of corporate governance drama's.

Discl: Held IRL

Extract of AFR article only:

This statement is fascinating for its lack of detail. What’s with the indeterminate amount of time? Is there a nominal value? Is the volume-weighted average price calculated by the share price movements of the previous quarter, or for the entire preceding period? Does Isaacs get more money if WiseTech shares go up? Or down? Is White making a killing off this or isn’t he? Do either of them even know?

Shareholders may want to ask because the numbers underlying the deal are so damn big. Isaacs held 8.17 per cent of RealWise, which in turn owned 37.43 per cent of WiseTech’s shares.

Deducting the upfront cash Isaacs received, White should at current market prices owe her roughly $1 billion. To settle that debt, he’s committed to pay her quarterly instalments of an unfixed amount, for an unspecified period. Isaacs is effectively taking on White’s credit risk. Think of it as a loan. A mystery $1 billion vendor loan taken out by the LinkedIn Lecher.

The terms should be of paramount importance to anyone invested in WiseTech’s success. White isn’t the CEO any more, but he is still easily the largest shareholder and remains a salaried “consultant” reporting to the chairman. Now he has a $1 billion commercial arrangement with a board director, which will be paid off, presumably, by further share sales (White’s been a monumental seller of late, including to pay for his divorce). How has all this not been clearly enunciated by the company?