FreighAI vs Zauber
Both companies build AI agents that sit above CargoWise and the other systems a forwarder already runs. Both read email, do the work behind it, and keep a person in charge. The overlap is close, and this page says so rather than inventing a difference.
FreighAI’s starting point differs in one respect. Every email your company receives is read, understood and turned into a task for the right person, with the answer already drafted. Your team approves. Nobody lives in the inbox any more.
Where Zauber is the better fit, this page says so. Every Zauber statement here was checked against its own published pages on 3 September 2026.
need DHL quote Gurugram → Ajman, 72kg, by Friday. express.
packing list attached. urgent pls 🙏
Pls quote for shipment as below. Confirmed pkg dims attached, IEC docs to follow…
- 01Both products are AI agents above CargoWise and the other systems you already run. Neither asks you to migrate.
- 02Zauber is built for top-tier forwarders rolling out across many country branches. Its CargoWise file creation, arrival notices and terminal ETA work go deeper than anything FreighAI names today.
- 03Zauber keeps your people in Outlook. In its own words, the inbox remains the core and there is no new system to learn.
- 04FreighAI takes the inbox off your team’s desk. Every company mailbox is read, and each conversation becomes a task for a named person, with the reply already drafted.
- 05FreighAI is built for mid-market forwarders of 40 to 200 people, and covers road and express as well as sea and air. Zauber’s published scope is sea and air.
- 06Bring one real email thread from last week to both demonstrations. Judge the work, not the slogans.
What Zauber does well
Zauber presents a coherent enterprise product. It builds pre-configured AI agents for sea and air freight forwarders, runs them from the operator’s Outlook inbox, and connects them to CargoWise One and the rate and file systems a large forwarder already uses. Its published story is unusually operational. Not only the quote, but the booking file, the arrival notice and the terminal ETA.
Zauber describes opening the booking in CargoWise One from the customer’s email and its attachments, filling parties, route, goods and references. What it cannot verify, such as a value that disagrees with the packing list, it flags rather than guesses. FreighAI does not name CargoWise among its live connections today. If your operation runs on CargoWise, weigh that.
An arrival notice sets the ETA, logs the milestone and drafts the onward emails, including trucker scheduling and the consignee notification. Terminal and carrier ETAs are watched against what the TMS believes. The trigger is the message itself, so the file is current before anyone opens it.
Instructions are written in plain language and take effect instantly, with session monitoring and adoption tracked by branch and by user. For a forwarder standardising one way of working across many countries, that is a governance answer as much as a product feature.
Made in Germany, hosted in the EU, full GDPR compliance, an ISO 27001 badge, independent security assessments and continuous vulnerability testing, with every action logged. For a European buyer with a data sovereignty requirement, that can settle the question before a workflow is compared. This page does not repeat Zauber’s published productivity, conversion or margin figures, because that evidence has not been independently reviewed here.
Same layer, same architecture, different buyer
Both products are AI agents above the system of record. Both read the email, find the information, draft the reply and stop for a person. On architecture alone this is the closest match on the board. What separates them is who each is built for, where your people sit, and how far the work travels after the first reply.
Inside Outlook, or instead of it
The overlap is real. The difference shows up in where your coordinator sits at ten in the morning, and in what happens to a conversation that belongs to somebody else.
Zauber’s product page puts it plainly. Zauber “lives in your inbox”, reading emails, drafting replies, pulling rates and updating the TMS. One of its own headings reads “Outlook remains the core”. There is no new system to learn and no workflow to change. The operator keeps the mailbox, and the agents work inside it.
FreighAI works instead of the inbox. It watches every company mailbox, pricing, operations, tracking and accounts, and follows each conversation from start to finish. It writes the reply, creates the task, and puts it in front of the right person in the right department, beside the original conversation. Your people work in FreighAI, not in the inbox.
The email is only the start. The real time goes on what comes after it. Find the rate on the carrier’s site. Check the tracking in another tab. Open the TMS for the job. Look up what you charged this customer last time. Forward it to operations and wait. Chase the agent, or forget to. FreighAI does all of that itself. It pulls your rate cards, checks the carrier, looks up the customer’s history, reads the shipment status, and talks to your TMS or accounting system. It chases what has not come back. It passes the work from pricing to operations to accounts, with the email and everything it found attached. Nobody forwards it. Nobody re-keys it. Nobody asks for an update. Then it puts the finished piece in front of the right person, with the reply already written.
How the work is assigned and approved
Both products stop for a person, and both say so. Zauber’s drafted quote is “ready to send or edit”. Its file creation says the operator confirms and the file is created. Low-confidence fields are marked for review.
Your team approves. They do not compose, forward, file or chase. The reply goes out in their name. Work passes from pricing to operations to accounts with the email and everything it found attached. Nobody forwards it, re-keys it or asks for an update.
The real difference is whose desk the work lands on. Zauber’s dashboard describes where a session hands back to an operator, and its material lists Teams and Slack among its integrations. Assignment of a finished task to a named person in another department is not described in Zauber’s published material, checked September 2026. Ask to see it.
Who each product is built for
Zauber says it builds purpose-built AI for top-tier forwarders. Its material names Top 20 forwarders, adoption tracked by branch and by user, and a product live across more than 40 country branches. FreighAI is built for mid-market forwarders of 40 to 200 people who have no in-house platform team. Neither statement is a criticism of the other. They are different buyers, and choosing the wrong one is expensive.
Scope differs too. Zauber’s published scope is sea and air freight forwarding. FreighAI covers express, air, ocean, road and multimodal work. Zauber names Outlook and Office 365 as the channel it lives in. FreighAI connects Gmail, Outlook and WhatsApp today, which matters if a real share of your enquiries arrive on WhatsApp.
- Every company mailbox, every department
- A task for a named person, thread beside it
- Hand-offs from pricing to operations to accounts
- Agent request-and-chase for lanes you do not hold
- Carrier-bill matching and payment collection
- Express, air, ocean, road and multimodal
- Agents that live in the operator’s Outlook
- Booking file created in CargoWise One
- Arrival notices, milestones and terminal ETAs
- Documents mapped into the TMS
- Plain-language instructions, tracked by branch
- Sea and air freight forwarding
What happens to one enquiry in FreighAI
An enquiry arrives. FreighAI reads it, notices the weight is missing and asks for it. It pulls your rate cards, checks the carrier for a live rate, and emails your agents for the lanes you do not hold, then chases them until they reply. It drafts the quote with your margin rules and what that customer paid on that lane last time. Your pricer approves and it goes. It follows up. When the customer pushes back, the counter-offer is already drafted. When the quote is old, it expires. When it is won, the job is created.
Where the rate can be fetched without waiting on a person — a carrier API, a portal read in the background, or your own uploaded rate cards — a priced quote goes out in 10–15 minutes instead of 1–2 hours. That holds for ocean and air just as it does for express; the mode does not change it. Where a lane has to be priced by another agent or over the phone, the wait belongs to whoever is answering — not to the software. FreighAI still writes the RFQ, chases the reply, and turns whatever comes back into a priced, margin-checked quote the moment it lands.
need DHL quote Gurugram → Ajman, 72kg, by Friday. urgent pls 🙏
Hi Marco — DHL Express, AED 425 + AED 35 handling. ETA Thu·18:00, valid 24h. PDF attached.
- 01EnquiryLands in the mailbox your customer already writes to.
- 02Missing weightThe gap is spotted and the question is drafted.
- 03Rates gatheredYour cards, the carrier, then agents for lanes you do not hold.
- 04Quote draftedMargin rules applied, with what this customer paid last time.
- GATEPricer approvesIt sends in their name.
- 06Chasers runFollow-ups continue on the same conversation.
- 07Counter-offerAlready written when the customer pushes back.
- 08Job createdA won quote becomes a filled-in job.
At Infinity Logistics, average response time fell from more than 60 minutes to about 15 minutes, and the win rate rose from 35% to 73%. That is one customer’s attributed result. It is not a promise made to every business.
Where the two differ
Every row is checked against public documentation. Where they do something we do not, the row says so.
- Where your team works
- FreighAI
- YesIn FreighAI. Your people stop working in the mailbox
- Zauber
- YesInside Outlook. Its material says the inbox remains the core
- What to verify
- Ask where the coordinator opens the day
- A named CargoWise One connection
- FreighAI
- NoNot among FreighAI’s live connections today. A TMS connection is scoped with your team
- Zauber
- YesFile creation in CargoWise One is a headline part of the product
- What to verify
- Zauber wins this row. Test it on your own instance
- Every company mailbox, every department
- FreighAI
- YesPricing, operations, tracking and accounts, each conversation followed to the end
- Zauber
- Not establishedAgents run from the operator’s inbox. Coverage of every department mailbox is not described in Zauber’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Ask for an accounts thread, not a pricing one
- Work assigned to a named person
- FreighAI
- YesEach conversation becomes a task in front of the right person in the right department
- Zauber
- Not establishedSessions hand back to an operator. Assignment to a named person elsewhere is not described in Zauber’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Follow one email to whoever ends up owning it
- Hand-offs between departments
- FreighAI
- YesPricing to operations to accounts, with the email and everything it found attached
- Zauber
- Not establishedTeams and Slack are listed among its integrations. Department-to-department hand-off is not described in Zauber’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Trace one job across three departments
- A person decides before anything sends
- FreighAI
- YesApprove, do not compose. The reply goes out in their name
- Zauber
- YesDrafts are ready to send or edit, low-confidence fields marked for review
- What to verify
- Ask both to show the exception path live
- Asks for what is missing
- FreighAI
- YesSpots the gap and drafts the email asking for it
- Zauber
- PartialIt flags what it cannot verify. Drafting the question back to the customer is not described in Zauber’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Send an RFQ with the weight left out
- Emails every agent for a lane and chases the quiet ones
- FreighAI
- YesOne request to all of them, route and charge lines filled in, then chasers
- Zauber
- Not establishedRates come from your rate management system and the customer’s contracts. An agent chase is not described in Zauber’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Price a lane you hold no rate for
- Milestones and terminal ETAs kept current in the TMS
- FreighAI
- PartialTracking replies answered from carrier status. Milestone writing at that scale is not a FreighAI claim
- Zauber
- YesArrival notices, milestone logging and terminal ETA watching are named product areas
- What to verify
- Zauber wins this row. Ask about your carrier mix
- Carrier-bill matching and payment collection
- FreighAI
- YesReads the carrier bill, matches every airway bill to its job, and chases payment
- Zauber
- Not establishedDocument extraction is described. Invoice matching and collection are not
- What to verify
- Compare only the workflows you actually need
- Freight modes covered
- FreighAI
- YesExpress, air, ocean, road and multimodal
- Zauber
- PartialIts published scope is sea and air freight forwarding
- What to verify
- Check your own mix before you shortlist either
- WhatsApp as an intake channel
- FreighAI
- YesLive today, alongside Gmail and Outlook
- Zauber
- Not establishedOutlook and Office 365 are named. WhatsApp is not described in Zauber’s published material, checked September 2026
- What to verify
- Count how many enquiries reach you on WhatsApp
- Central process definition in plain language, tracked by branch
- FreighAI
- PartialWorkflows are scoped with your team rather than offered as a self-service builder
- Zauber
- YesA headline part of the platform, with adoption tracked by branch and user
- What to verify
- Zauber wins this row for a multi-country rollout
- European data residency and published certification
- FreighAI
- Not establishedNot part of the approved public claim set for this page. Ask us directly
- Zauber
- YesMade in Germany, hosted in the EU, GDPR, with an ISO 27001 badge
- What to verify
- Zauber wins this row on published evidence
- Coexistence with an existing TMS or ERP
- FreighAI
- YesStandalone or alongside
- Zauber
- YesAbove CargoWise One and other systems, with no migration
- What to verify
- Verify the exact operations, not a logo on a page
“Not described” means Zauber’s published material did not establish an answer, checked September 2026. It never means Zauber cannot do it. Close any row that affects your decision in the demonstration.
One question decides this: whose desk does the work land on?
Zauber leaves your operator in Outlook and works around them. FreighAI takes the mailbox off the desk and hands a named person a finished task. Both are defensible. They are not the same product.
- Every company mailboxWatches every company mailbox, pricing, operations, tracking and accounts, and follows each conversation from start to finish.
- A task, not a messageWrites the reply, creates the task, and puts it in front of the right person in the right department, beside the original conversation.
- It runs without being remindedChasing, tracking checks, quote expiry and follow-ups run on their own. Nobody has to remember.
Which one you should actually pick
If nobody should ever choose the other product, this page would not be worth reading. Here is where each genuinely wins.
- Your operation runs on CargoWise One and you want a shipped connection to it rather than a scoped one.
- The work you most want covered sits after the booking. Arrival notices, milestones, terminal ETAs and documents read into the TMS.
- You are a large forwarder rolling one standard out across many branches, and you need adoption tracked by branch and by user.
- European data residency and published certification are a gate you must clear before any workflow is discussed.
- You want your people to stay in Outlook and change as little as possible about how they work today. That is a legitimate choice, and Zauber makes it well.
- You want your team out of the mailbox altogether. Every department’s email read, and each conversation turned into a task for a named person with the reply already drafted.
- The pain is the legwork around the quote. Asking for the missing detail, emailing every agent for a lane, chasing the quiet ones, drafting the counter-offer.
- The work has to travel. Pricing to operations to accounts, with the email and everything it found attached, and nobody forwarding anything.
- You move road or express freight as well as sea and air, or a real share of your enquiries arrive on WhatsApp.
- You are a mid-market forwarder without an in-house platform team, and the first workflow has to run standalone with the option to sit alongside a TMS later. Keep your TMS for the records. FreighAI runs the work around them.
Same team. 5x more business. is the value FreighAI aims at, not a measured result for every business. Decide from what each product does with your own work, not from a comparison table.
Can you run both, or do you have to choose?
Running both is possible on paper and awkward in practice. Both products read the same email, draft the same reply and write to the same system of record. Point them at the same enquiry and you get two drafts, two records and an argument about which one is true.
One arrangement can work. Split by workflow, not by mailbox. One product owns the commercial conversation and the other owns a separate downstream job, with one system of record, one customer identity and a written rule about who hands off to whom. Neither supplier will arrive at that by accident.
For most forwarders comparing the same work, this is a choice rather than a combination. Which is why the buying question is the one at the top of this page. Should your people stay in Outlook, or should the inbox stop being the place your company runs?
What should you ask both suppliers to show?
Bring the same evidence to both demonstrations. One real email thread from last week, with its whole history. Three enquiries: one normal, one difficult, one missing a detail. The rate sources you actually use. The system that owns the job once it is won.
- The same enquiry end to end, from the first email to the created job.
- What happens when a rate has to come from another agent rather than a rate card.
- The moment a person approves, and what they see beside the draft.
- A conversation that belongs to a different department, and where it lands.
- What runs overnight when nobody is watching.
- One thing the product gets wrong, and how a person catches it.
Then ask the question this page opened with. At ten in the morning, where is your coordinator sitting? In Outlook with an agent helping, or in a product with the day’s work already assigned? Both answers are defensible. Only one of them is yours.
Common questions
Is Zauber a TMS?
No. By its own positioning it is a set of AI agents that work above CargoWise One and other transport management systems, with no migration. Its product page says Outlook remains the core, so the agents run inside the operator’s inbox rather than replacing it.
Does FreighAI connect to CargoWise?
CargoWise is not one of FreighAI’s named live connections today. FreighAI connects Gmail, Outlook, WhatsApp, DHL, FedEx and UPS, and talks to a TMS or accounting system as part of a scoped first workflow. We scope the first workflow, integration requirements and implementation plan with your team. If a shipped CargoWise connector is your requirement now, Zauber names one and FreighAI does not.
Which one suits a large forwarder better?
Zauber says it is built for top-tier forwarders and describes a product live across more than 40 country branches. FreighAI is built for mid-market forwarders of 40 to 200 people without an in-house platform team. Size is the honest first filter between these two.
Does either handle road or express freight?
FreighAI covers express, air, ocean, road and multimodal work. Zauber’s published scope is sea and air freight forwarding. If road or express is a real part of your business, ask Zauber directly rather than assuming either way.
Which is cheaper?
Neither company publishes comparable pricing, so this page does not guess. Ask both for terms on the same workflow, the same connections and the same volume.
Do both keep people in control?
Your team approves every reply before it sends. Your team approves. They do not compose, forward, file or chase. The reply goes out in their name. Zauber’s material describes drafts that are ready to send or edit, and a balance you set between what is automated and what is reviewed. Ask both to demonstrate the gate on a real exception, not on a clean example.
- Zauber homepage — “AI Agents for Sea & Air Freight”, “purpose-built AI for top-tier forwarders”, Zauber Technology GmbH of Berlin founded 2024, live across more than 40 country branches, connecting Office 365, CargoWise One and carrier portals with no migration. Published outcome figures and the named customer are not repeatedverified 2026-09-03
- Zauber Product — “Zauber lives in your inbox”, “Outlook remains the core”, the six use cases including CargoWise file creation, arrival notice and terminal ETA, drafts “ready to send or edit”, sessions that hand back to an operator, the integrations listverified 2026-09-03
- Zauber Why us — “From forwarders, for forwarders”, Top 20 forwarders and deep CW1 integrations at global scale, agents connecting Outlook to the TMS and RMS while operators keep working as before. Implementation-timing statements are not repeatedverified 2026-09-03
- Zauber Security — “Made in Germany. Hosted in the EU.”, GDPR and European data residency, ISO 27001 badge, independent assessments and continuous vulnerability testing, automate what you are confident in and review what you are notverified 2026-09-03
- Zauber Manifesto — “AI won’t replace the expertise that moves global trade. It will amplify it.”verified 2026-09-03
- Zauber Imprint — Zauber Technology GmbH, Almstadtstrasse 18, 10119 Berlin. Source for the headquarters line onlyverified 2026-09-03
- Zauber Team — the team by function. No funding statement is published, so none is repeatedverified 2026-09-03
- Infinity Logistics customer reference, 15 May 2026 — response time and win rate, attributed to Infinityverified 2026-08-31
FreighAI claims come from the shared claims file and the signed Infinity Logistics reference of 15 May 2026. Zauber’s published productivity, conversion, margin and time-saved figures, its named customer and its implementation-timing statements are deliberately not repeated. Where Zauber’s material does not cover something, this page says it is not described rather than absent.
Bring one real email thread from last week
Pick a thread that went badly. The one with four forwards, a missing document and a customer who asked twice. Ask both teams to show what their product would have done with it, from the first message to the created job. That one test tells you more than any matrix, this one included.