Merging Companies

I seen an article today on Facebook about KLLM or Knight Transportation owns Swift and another company. Anyone have thoughts on this? Is it a good thing? Bad thing?

Knight & Swift officially merged in September of 2017 forming a single holding company called Knight-Swift owning and operating the two individual trucking companies independently, maintaining their own fleets, terminals and driver pool. Knight drivers only drive Knight trucks, paid by Knight. Same holds true for Swift.

KLLM was not involved in the Knight-Swift merger.

The merger has thus far had no effect on drivers and probably won't. Take things you read on Facebook and other social media with a grain of salt.

Probably what you saw was telling about the recent acquisition of Abilene Transportation under that same Umbrella. It's a common move in this industry. Commodities businesses can generally perform better with greater economies of scale. I suspect there will be more of this type activity due to recent changes in the freight business environment.

It should not concern the drivers. Usually life goes on just as it always has. These are moves to strengthen the balance sheet in order to attract more stock holders. Any kind of move that strengthens the financial resources of the company is a good thing in my opinion.

Knight has been silently making acquisitions like this for a good many years now. All of a sudden it became big news when Swift was joined into the fold.

As written above, nothing new about this for the trucking industry. Goes back to the beginning really. In times past, a trucking company might be bought by a non-transportation business for the sole reason of acquiring their ICC Authority. That used to be a nearly insurmountable item to get your own. After deregulation, it became much easier. Most companies grow larger through acquiring others in this business.

So as someone who is looking into trucking schools, I would look into Knight and Swift as individual entities.

That's correct.

I came to Swift a few months before the merger was completed so I can not really speak to the before Knight period.

According to my DM all the pay changes have been because of the merger. I have gotten three raises since I upgraded, and with the new raise structure I'll get my "annual" raise every nine months instead of yearly.

They are also making changes to safety and training, but haven't heard much more on that.

I'm sure Glad Hand, Errol, or Chris can fill in the wholes for me.

I came to Swift a few months before the merger was completed so I can not really speak to the before Knight period.

According to my DM all the pay changes have been because of the merger. I have gotten three raises since I upgraded, and with the new raise structure I'll get my "annual" raise every nine months instead of yearly.

They are also making changes to safety and training, but haven't heard much more on that.

I'm sure Glad Hand, Errol, or Chris can fill in the wholes for me.

Big T, I know of one documented Swift CPM increase related specifically to the merger. The other increase had to do with countering the increased pay occurring throughout the industry, a competitive measure. Don't recall the third...and perhaps it's because of being on a Dedicated Account, not sure.