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Despite the slowdown in freight shipping this year, a record number of Chattanooga's trucking and logistics businesses moved into the fast lane in 2022 among America's fastest-growing businesses.

In its annual ranking of the nation's top growing companies, Inc. magazine includes 20 Chattanooga companies on its list of the 5,000 U.S. businesses with the fastest rate of revenue growth in the past three years. Among the local companies on the new Inc. 5000 list, 70% are either logistics companies or businesses servicing the trucking industry.

"I think logistics are driving our entrepreneurial and startup economy here in Chattanooga, which is why we have called this 'Freight Alley,'" Freightwaves CEO Craig Fuller said in a telephone interview Wednesday. "We have a high concentration of talent here in a business that encourages growth and innovation, so I think we'll continue to see a lot of growth in many of these startup businesses in logistics."

Fuller, whose family has been involved in building such trucking giants as Southwest Motor Freight, U.S. Xpress Enterprises, Covenant Logistics and Transcard in Chattanooga, monitors and reports on the logistics industry for the software and media company Freightwaves, which was among the companies included on the Inc. 5000 list again this year.

Fuller said Chattanooga now rivals Chicago as a hub for the logistics industry, which is why Fuller said Freighwaves is bringing its "F3: Future of Freight Festival" to Chattanooga in November. Similar to last fall, the three-day event is expected to draw thousands of freight industry leaders to Chattanooga.

Ted Alling, one of the founders of the freight brokerage firm Access America and an investor in a number of logistics startups in Chattanooga, said the new Inc. 5000 list underscores his belief that "Chattanooga is the best city in the US to start a logistics business.

"We have a deep talent pool locally that is attracting new investments from logistics start-ups and expansion from other prominent industry players," Alling said in an emailed statement Wednesday. "There is also an incredible amount of buy-in from the local VC and academic communicate. UTC and Chatt State have been incredibly supportive."

Making the list

The slowdown in freight shipments and mergers in the industry, such as KnightSwift buying U.S. Xpress, may lead to some employee dislocations, including the termination of nearly 30,000 employees withthe bankrupt Yellow Corp. But with Chattanooga's industry foundation and talent pool, other startup ventures in logistics are likely to be spurred by the industry shakeups Fuller said.

The 20 Chattanooga companies on the new Inc. 5000 list are 25% more than the previous record high reached last year on the 2022 Inc. 5000 list.

Collectively, the companies on the new Inc. 5000 list grew their revenues by 219% over the past three years to reach a total of $358.2 billion last year. The companies on the list also have added nearly 1.2 million jobs to the U.S. economy, according to Inc. magazine.

"Steaming" ahead

The fastest growing logistics business in Chattanooga on the Inc. 5000 list is Steam Logistics, an international freight broker that moved into the renovated John Ross building this spring with more than 500 of the company's 700 employees.

Steam Logistics, which ranked No. 260 on the Inc. 5000 list, has been on the list of the fastest growing companies for seven consecutive years after the firm was started in 2012. Jason Provonsha, the founder and chief executive of Steam Logistics, called this year's ranking "particularly special" because the growth was built on a much bigger base than previous listings.

"Going from a $33 million company in 2019 to $765 million (in revenues) last year is an experience I will never forget," Provoncha said in an emailed statement Wednesday. "We've built a unique and diverse culture at Steam, and we're fortunate to have a team who takes such good care of that culture. I think it's as big of a reason for our success as anything."

Steam Logistics is among more than a dozen local freight brokerage companies that help arrange shipments and act as brokers between companies needing goods to be shipped and the trucking or other carriers that deliver such products.

More than half of the Inc. 5000 companies in Chattanooga this year are freight brokers, but others such as Freightwaves, Workhound and Reliance Partners serve the trucking and logistics industries with tracking data, employee surveys and accounting services.

Chattanooga's fastest-growing businesses

Among the 5,000 fastest-growing businesses in America over the past three years, 20 are headquartered in Chattanooga, and 14 of those are in logistics or are logistics support companies. The top local companies on the Inc. 5000 list and their rankings for growth from 2019 to 2022 include:

Steam Logistics, a freight brokerage firm started in 2012 and headed by Jason Provonsha, is No. 260 on the list with a growth of 2,151%.

http://www.mocalogistics.com,a logistics firm started in 2018 and headed by Jorge Papatzikos, is No. 766 on the list with a growth rate of 768%.

KCH Transportation,a freight broker started in 2014 and headed by Jason Whitten, is No. 999 on the list with a growth rate of 593%.

Trident Transport, a freight broker started in 2013 and headed by Heath Haley, is No. 1,331 on the list with a growth rate of 437%.

F2F Transport,a freight broker started in 2016 and headed by Brian Starnes, is No, 1,386 on the list with a growth rate of 437%.

Text Request, a telecommunications and texting company started in 2014 by Brian Elrod, is No. 1,341 on the list with a growth rate of 434%.

WAP Sustainability, an environmental services firm started in 2009 and headed by William Paddock, is No. 1,693 on the list with a growth rate of 330%.

Syssero,a business products company started in 2016 and headed by Amber Lowry, is No 2,042 on the list with a growth rate of 275%.

Logistix,a freight broker started in 2016 and headed by Carlos Garcia, is No. 2,062 on the list with a growth rate of 273%.

Max Trans Logistics of Chattanooga, a freight broker started in 2006 and headed by Mike McCallie, is No. 2,325 on the list with a growth rate of 273%.

White Harvest Energy,an energy firm started in 2014 and headed by Ben Edgar, is 2,337 on the list with a growth rate of 236%.

Freightwaves,a software and media company covering logistics that was started in 2016 and is headed by Craig Fuller, is 2,386 on the list with a growth rate of 231%.

Reliance Partners,an insurance broker that serves the logistics industry, was founded in 2009, is headed by Andrew Ladebauche and is No. 3,294 on the list with a growth rate of 230%.

Market Street Partners,an accounting firm started in 2016 and headed by Kyle Bryant, is No. 2,559 on the list with a growth rate of 213%.

Workhound, a survey and software firm that serves the logistics industry, was started in 2015, is headed by Max Farrell and is listed No, 2,897 with a growth rate of 182%.

Taimen Trucklines,a trucking firm started in 2017 and headed by Christopher Wang, is No. 3,537 on the list with a growth rate of 140%.

Delegator,an advertising firm started in 2009 and headed by Andrew Scarbrough, is No. 4,264 on the list with a growth rate of 103%.

Ambition,a software company started in 2014 and headed by Travis Truett, is No. 4,569 with a growth rate of 90%.

Source:Inc. 5000

Contact Dave Flessner at dflessner@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6340.

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In April, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai took an unusual step: merging two large artificial intelligence teams -- with distinct cultures and code -- to catch up to and surpass OpenAI and other rivals. Now the test of that effort is coming, with hundreds of people scrambling to release a group of large machine-learning models -- one of the highest-stakes products the company has ever built -- this fall. The Information: The models, collectively known as Gemini, are expected to give Google the ability to build products its competitors can't, according to a person involved with Gemini's development. OpenAI's GPT-4 large-language model can understand and produce conversational text. Gemini will go beyond that, combining the text capabilities of LLMs like GPT-4 with the ability to create AI images based on a text description, similar to AI-image generators Midjourney and Stable Diffusion, this person said. Gemini's image capabilities haven't been previously reported.

Google employees have also discussed using Gemini to offer features like analyzing charts or creating graphics with text descriptions and controlling software using text or voice commands. Google is betting on Gemini to power services ranging from its Bard chatbot, which competes with OpenAI's ChatGPT, to enterprise apps like Google Docs and Slides. Google also wants to charge app developers for access to Gemini through its Google Cloud server-rental unit. Google Cloud currently sells access to more primitive Google-made AI models through a product called Vertex AI. Those new features could help Google catch up with Microsoft, which has raced ahead with new AI features for its Office 365 apps and has also been selling access to OpenAI's models to its app customers.

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How Google is Planning To Beat OpenAI - Slashdot

Tesla is hiring staff for the company's new "first of its kind" data centers. Electrek reports: Tesla has shared a new job posting for a "Sr. Engineering Program Manager, Data Center" role first spotted by Electrek last week. In the job posting, Tesla says that it will build "1st of its kind Data Centers": "This role will lead the end-to-end design and engineering of Tesla's 1st of its kind Data Centers and will be one of the key members of the factory engineering team." Tesla didn't explain how those data centers will be "1st of their kind," which is not something you'd expect in a job posting anyway.

But interestingly, the new effort comes as Tesla has been taking over data centers from Twitter. [...] The Information reported that Tesla has taken over one of the old Twitter data centers leased from NTT Data that the social media company was using in Sacramento. The report also mentions that Tesla is in talks with Prime Data Centers to use another data center that Twitter used to have in Sacramento.

Tesla is seeing its need for data processing increasing rapidly as it tries to take advantage of its growing fleet of millions of vehicles all equipped with cameras in order to improve the neural nets powering its self-driving effort. The automaker is also handling a growing number of connectivity features that it tries to sell to vehicle owners through a $10-a-month "Premium Connectivity" subscription service. On the energy side, Tesla is also handling a lot of data to operate its virtual power plant and its services to distributed energy assets, like Autobidder and Powerhub.

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Long lines have formed at ATMs around Ireland tonight as a cash machine glitch is allowing customers to withdraw more cash than they have in their accounts. Independent.ie reports: The fault with the online app allows people who have no money in their account to transfer up to 500 euros into a Revolut account. Some people claimed they were able to get access to 1,000 eros, but the bank insisted the daily withdrawal limit is 500 euros. Once people use their Bank of Ireland app to transfer the funds to Revolut they can then withdraw the cash from the Revoult account through any ATM.

Huge queues at ATMs in Dublin, Limerick, Dundalk and other parts of the country were reported this evening as people took advantage of the screw-up to withdraw cash from their Revolut accounts. There were reports in Dundalk of gardai (the state police force of the Irish Republic) having to control crowds at ATMs in the town. The frenzied withdrawal of cash was despite warnings on social media that there is no such thing as free cash and the money will have to be repaid. The bank said in a statement: "We are working on a technical issue that is impacting a number of our services including our mobile app and 365Online. We are working to fix this as quickly as possible and apologize to customers for any inconvenience caused."

"We would like to remind customers that if they transfer or withdraw funds -- including over their normal limits -- this money will be debited from their account," the bank added. "While we are conscious customers may not be able to check their balance at this time, they should not withdraw or transfer funds if they are likely to become overdrawn."

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Researchers seem to have solved the puzzle of LK-99. Scientific detective work has unearthed evidence that the material is not a superconductor, and clarified its actual properties. Nature: The conclusion dashes hopes that LK-99 -- a compound of copper, lead, phosphorus and oxygen -- marked the discovery of the first superconductor that works at room temperature and ambient pressure. Instead, studies have shown that impurities in the material -- in particular, copper sulfide -- were responsible for the sharp drops in electrical resistivity and partial levitation over a magnet, which looked similar to properties exhibited by superconductors. "I think things are pretty decisively settled at this point," says Inna Vishik, a condensed-matter experimentalist at the University of California, Davis.

The LK-99 saga began in late July, when a team led by Sukbae Lee and Ji-Hoon Kim at the Quantum Energy Research Centre, a start-up firm in Seoul, published preprints claiming that LK-99 is a superconductor at normal pressure and temperatures up to at least 127C (400 kelvin). All previously confirmed superconductors function only at extreme temperatures and pressures. The extraordinary claim quickly grabbed the attention of the science-interested public and researchers, some of whom tried to replicate LK-99. Initial attempts did not see signs of room-temperature superconductivity, but were not conclusive. Now, after dozens of replication efforts, many experts are confidently saying that the evidence shows LK-99 is not a room-temperature superconductor. The South Korean team based its claim on two of LK-99's properties: levitation above a magnet and abrupt drops in resistivity. But separate teams in Beijing, at Peking University and the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), found mundane explanations for these phenomena.

Another study, by US and European researchers, combined experimental and theoretical evidence to demonstrate how LK-99's structure made superconductivity infeasible. And other experimenters synthesized and studied pure samples of LK-99, erasing doubts about the material's structure and confirming that it is not a superconductor, but an insulator. The only further confirmation would come from the Korean team sharing their samples, says Michael Fuhrer, a physicist at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. "The burden's on them to convince everybody else," he says. Perhaps the most striking evidence for LK-99's superconductivity was a video taken by the Korean team that showed a coin-shaped sample of silvery material wobbling over a magnet. The team said the sample was levitating because of the Meissner effect -- a hallmark of superconductivity in which a material expels magnetic fields. Multiple unverified videos of LK-99 levitating subsequently circulated on social media, but none of the researchers who initially tried to replicate the findings observed any levitation.

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