Lufthansa Cargo has launched a pilot program in three European countries ahead of its plan to offer its capacity worldwide through the online platform CargoAi.

As part of the pilot, users in the Netherlands, Italy and Spain will have access to routings and capacity information on all Lufthansa Group airlines serving those countries.

It said general and express cargo can now be booked on Lufthansa, Austrian, Brussels, Eurowings, or SunExpress.

"This initial roll-out is a pilot that will run for the next two to three months, during which CargoAi and Lufthansa Cargo fine-tune their preparations for a global go-live, should the technical pilot run smoothly," the announcement said.

CargoAi noted that Lufthansa Cargo will benefit from an easy-to-use, customized e-booking system, allowing the carrier to optimize the efficiency of its forwarding process.

It will also benefit from the promotion of its services to the more than 5,000 freight forwarders across 103 countries who regularly use CargoAi’s marketplace.

"We are honoured that Lufthansa Cargo, one of Europe's largest air cargo carriers, has chosen to market its capacities on our platform," said Matthieu Petot, CEO of CargoAi.

"Lufthansa Cargo has often pioneered innovation in its long history and is again ahead of the digital curve with CargoAi: it is the first and only airline so far to enable forwarders to make use of our instant rate offer and booking confirmation functionalities."

Ashwin Bhat, CCO of Lufthansa Cargo, noted that Lufthansa wants to give its customers a choice of booking channels.

"The impressive success that CargoAi has demonstrated in just the four years since it was founded, mirrors the innovation that we strive for within our company and industry. Lufthansa Cargo was among the first to introduce eBooking-channels within the airfreight segment, and we have large numbers of customers using the e-booking functionality in three pilot countries," Bhat added.

"We will be listening with interest regarding the new software’s features and user-friendliness & experience."

Following a successful pilot, Lufthansa Cargo and CargoAi will begin to roll out its CargoAi service across the network.