Arizona Tribune - Aura Dispatch Brings AI Dispatch to Small Trucking Fleets as Truckload Margins Fall Below Zero

DENVER, CO / ACCESS Newswire / October 29, 2026 / Aura Dispatch, an AI freight dispatch company co-founded by Denver entrepreneur Nicholas Van Raalte, will launch for select trucking fleets in early 2027, bringing automated dispatch, a capability the company says has largely been limited to large carriers, to operators running 15 trucks or fewer.

Small fleets carry most of the U.S. trucking industry, and they are under pressure. More than 91% of U.S. motor carriers run 10 or fewer trucks, and more than half run a single truck, according to the American Trucking Associations. Truckload carriers averaged an operating margin of -2.3% in 2024, and trucks ran empty for 16.7% of their miles, according to the American Transportation Research Institute.

For those carriers, the difference between a profitable week and a losing one is often which loads they book. Finding them is still manual work: scrolling load boards, calling brokers, negotiating rates and writing down the details, usually by an owner who is also driving.

Built from 15 years in freight

Aura Dispatch began with an operator who had lived those problems. Co-founder and CEO Sebastian had run a freight business for 15 years and was tired of the old way of dispatching: high dispatcher turnover, fraud, endless calls and emails with brokers, duplicate load listings, the best loads gone before anyone could react to a new post, and costly calculation mistakes by untrained dispatchers.

He brought the idea to Van Raalte, who recruited Adam as chief technology officer to build the platform. The three spent hundreds of hours turning Sebastian's process, knowledge and strategy into the heuristics and guardrails that govern how Aura's AI evaluates and selects loads.

How it works

Aura Dispatch takes over the search. It scans the load boards and broker networks a fleet already uses and ranks loads against the fleet's lanes, equipment, deadhead and rate targets. It then contacts brokers to collect rates and load details and turns each call into structured notes covering the agreed rate, pickup and delivery windows, accessorials and contacts. The dispatcher reviews the shortlist and books with one click, from a desktop, by text or by email.

"Most trucking companies are one or two trucks, and the owner is the driver, the dispatcher and the bookkeeper at the same time," said Nicholas Van Raalte, co-founder of Aura Dispatch. "Every hour spent on load boards and broker calls is an hour they can't drive or rest. Aura does the searching and the calling. The person who knows the trucks still makes the decision."

The system learns from every load a fleet books or skips, and reports earnings by truck, lane and time period. The company's goal is for Aura to identify and select loads faster and more accurately than a human dispatcher, lifting profits for operators already stretched thin.

Aura Dispatch charges 5% per booked load with no monthly fee. Setup begins with a call to review a fleet's lanes, equipment and load boards, and the company says most fleets are booking loads within their first week.

Fleets can join the waitlist or book a call at auradispatch.com.

About Aura Dispatch

Aura Dispatch (Dispatch AI Inc.) builds AI dispatch software for trucking fleets. Its system scans load boards and broker networks, gathers rates and details from brokers, and ranks loads against each fleet's lanes, equipment and rate targets, while dispatchers keep the final booking decision. Built for fleets of 15 trucks or fewer, it was co-founded in 2025 by CEO Sebastian, CTO Adam and Nicholas Van Raalte.

Media Contact

Organization: Aura Dispatch
Contact Person Name: Nicholas Van Raalte
Website: https://auradispatch.com/
Email: [email protected]
City: Denver
State: CO
Country: United States

SOURCE: Aura Dispatch

View the original press release on ACCESS Newswire

R.Garcia--AT