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How can CSPs use AI, satellite-cellular convergence, blockchain and TM Forum Open APIs to orchestrate trusted, resilient supply chain services?
Bringing AI-powered trust to global supply chains
Every day, life-saving medicines, vaccines, insulin, perishable food and high-value goods move across borders by road, rail, sea and air. But cold chain failures, connectivity gaps, climate disruption, tampering, theft and fragmented visibility can put those shipments at risk.
The Hyperconnected intelligent network of trust (HINT) for supply chain - Phase III Catalyst, winner of the Moonshot Catalyst: Composable IT & Ecosystems challenge award and a finalist in the Moonshot Catalyst Attendees’ Choice award, addresses this problem by showing how communications service providers (CSPs) can move beyond connectivity to orchestrate trusted, monetizable supply chain services.
HINT is aligned to TM Forum’s Composable IT and Ecosystem Mission challenge, which focuses on how CSPs can reinvent themselves as AI-native platforms that orchestrate ecosystems and monetize intelligence. The Catalyst applies that ambition to global logistics, where multiple partners, systems and networks must work together in near real time.
Rather than treating shipment tracking, connectivity, insurance, billing and compliance as separate processes, HINT brings them together as a composable “Shipment-as-a-Service” model. Shippers define requirements such as cargo type, temperature range, compliance needsand delivery constraints. Agentic AI then helps select the right service bundle, optimize routes, assess risk and trigger the required connectivity, monitoring, billing and assurance capabilities.
At the heart of the solution is seamless terrestrial and non-terrestrial network convergence. HINT is designed to maintain connectivity across terrestrial 5G, satellite, direct-to-cell and private 5G environments, including maritime scenarios where refrigerated containers may spend weeks at sea and physical intervention is impossible.
IoT sensors capture temperature, humidity, vibration, location, power consumption and network quality. Edge AI correlates those signals to detect early signs of cargo risk, such as refrigeration degradation or abnormal temperature behavior, before spoilage occurs. During connectivity gaps, edge intelligence can continue monitoring and adjust parameters autonomously.
The team is targeting telemetry uptime of at least 99.5% across terrestrial and non-terrestrial network hops, cold chain integrity of no more than 0.5°C hour cumulative excursion per shipment, and a 15% to 30% reduction in spoilage compared with baseline performance.
HINT applies AI across the shipment lifecycle. At the customer interaction stage, AI-assisted product selection translates shipment requirements into compliant, resilient and predictable service bundles. For operations teams, AI supports dynamic route optimization using weather patterns, natural catastrophe predictions, climate risk models and operational data to avoid high-risk areas and minimize delays.
The Catalyst also introduces a financial resilience layer. Insurance premiums can be calculated dynamically based on the selected plan, route risk and observed operational behavior. Parametric insurance can then use verified data to trigger automated claims, with the project targeting payouts in under five minutes and potential premium reductions of 10% to 20%.
Supply chain journeys rarely follow a static plan. Routes change, coverage shifts and connectivity can transition dynamically between terrestrial, satellite and private 5G environments. HINT demonstrates how event-driven billing and settlement can follow the reality of each journey rather than relying on fixed assumptions.
Real-time usage events capture handovers, reroutes and connectivity changes. Hybrid convergent charging spans terrestrial and non-terrestrial networks, while explainable AI translates complex charges into natural language for customers and partners. Automated settlement across CSPs, satellite connectivity providers, insurers, logistics operators and shippers reduces reconciliation effort and supports faster settlement cycles.
For CSPs, this creates opportunities to monetize satellite-enabled enterprise services, risk intelligence, predictive analytics, dynamic billing and ecosystem orchestration. The team is targeting up to 20% API-driven revenue growth and a 30% AI-driven increase in customer lifetime value.
The solution uses TM Forum Open Digital Architecture (ODA) and TM Forum Open APIs to integrate partners across the ecosystem. These include APIs for product catalog, ordering, configuration, quote management, customer billing, service ordering, service
