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Chain Solutions business dropped more than $ 3 billion to $ 13.2 billion in 2023 , representing one-third of the overall corporate decline in revenue . “ Within that $ 3 billion , Coyote made up 38 % of the decline for the year , and 48 % of the decline in the fourth quarter ,” Tomé said . That would put the drop in Coyote ’ s revenue at more than $ 1.2 billion year over year . Tomé , who was on UPS ’ s board of directors at the time of the Coyote acquisition , said UPS did not fully appreciate how cyclical truckload and intermodal brokerage was at the time . When acquiring Coyote for $ 1.8 billion in 2015 , UPS said it was capturing a “ high-growth market ” in Coyote Logistics . But on Jan . 30 , UPS said Coyote has “ a very low margin ” and is “ highly cyclical with considerable earnings volatility .”

Former Slync CEO Kirchner convicted over misuse of company funds

A federal jury on Jan . 25 convicted Chris Kirchner , the founder of logistics technology startup Slync , on four counts of wire fraud and seven counts of engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from specified unlawful activity , the US Justice Department said in a press release . Kirchner was on trial in a US federal court in North Texas and will be sentenced July 11 , facing up to 20 years in federal prison per count of wire fraud and up to 10 years per count for the other convictions . Kirchner was accused of moving money invested into Slync — a technology company designed to help shippers and forwarders automate core processes such as booking , allocation and data processing — into personal accounts that were spent on a private plane , cars and a golf club membership , among other expenses . During Kirchner ’ s tenure as CEO , Slync landed a couple of notable pilot customers , including DHL and Kuehne + Nagel . But the company ’ s revenue languished amid a competitive landscape of software vendors , from core forwarding software providers such as WiseTech Global to integration specialists including Chain . io , pitching their products to forwarders . The spending came to light in spring 2022 as Slync employees went unpaid for weeks , an issue Kirchner attributed to a problem with the company ’ s payroll provider , which the Justice Department said in its Jan . 25 statement was untrue . Kirchner was indicted in May by a federal grand jury after the Justice Department filed a string of charges against him in February . He was ousted in August 2022 by Slync ’ s board , who replaced him with industry veteran John Urban in October . The company was able to secure new funding from its existing investors in February 2023 , but then abruptly filed for bankruptcy and closed in October , citing ongoing costs from defending itself against a lawsuit from Kirchner .

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