TEF Ignition 2026 · Bocconi University

Which of tomorrow’s loads will a restriction hit?

zhol answers it the evening before, for the traffic offices of small and mid-sized forwarders and hauliers on international lanes. One WhatsApp message, only when a load is hit, with the options. We start in Italy.

Try the betaRead our answers to the TEF jury
Illustration: a folded map of Europe with a route, a warning triangle, a truck and a red pencil
Alikhan · Inkara · Tomiris · Bocconi University
On the roads right now

What is coming in the next eight weeks, and how likely it is

    Open the whole radarSee it on the mapUpdated twice a day from the news, the official calendars and the weather at the passes.

    Road restrictions cost freight money every day

    €544M

    a year: what Tyrol’s Brenner restrictions and the Luegbrücke works cost Italy (€463M of it freight)

    21 of 57

    dosing days at Kufstein in 2025 came outside the published calendar

    €400M+

    lost in eight days of blockades in southern Italy, October 2026

    Who pays: the traffic office

    6 countries, 6 rulebooks, checked by hand the evening before

    €100 an hour for every hour a truck waits (Italian law, L. 105/2025)

    Fresh loads spoil when a route closes and nobody knows what is open

    Sources: Uniontrasporti via AGI (30 May 2026) · Land Tirol and ADAC · Il Messaggero tally, 24 Oct 2026 · DL 73/2025, L. 105/2025

    Rules move, data goes digital, drivers are scarce

    The rules move2030

    Until then the Luegbrücke on the Brenner motorway runs one lane each way while it is rebuilt.

    Tyrol planned 30 dosing days for 2026 and added 15 unplanned ones by August.

    Road data goes digital27

    EU countries must publish truck bans, closures and roadworks as digital data that software can read.

    From 9 July 2027 every EU authority must also accept digital freight papers.

    Drivers are scarce502,000

    truck-driver jobs unfilled in Europe, and about 660,000 drivers retire by 2030.

    With 9 to 10 driving hours a day, a long queue can cost a delivery slot.

    Sources: ADAC · Land Tirol · Reg. (EU) 2022/670 · Reg. (EU) 2020/1056 · IRU via trans.info · Reg. (EC) 561/2006

    Eight days of blockades emptied the South’s shelves

    Reuters · 21 Oct

    Italian retailers warn of food shortages caused by truck drivers’ protest

    AP · 23 Oct

    Millions in cheese revenue lost as protest torpedoes Italy’s buffalo mozzarella output

    Il Messaggero · 24 Oct

    Blocco tir, i danni della protesta valgono già 400 milioni

    Campania · four days of pickets€200–300M

    €150M of farm produce wasted · €20M of fuel sales lost, 9 in 10 stations shut

    Sicily · five-day stoppage, 16–20 October€90–100M

    €50M on farms around Vittoria (Coldiretti) · €40–50M in food retail (Confcommercio)

    Full bar = €400M. Puglia, Calabria, Basilicata and Molise have no published estimate yet.

    On the ground€800

    for one traffic office: one truck stuck a day at a picket, priced at the legal €100 an hour

    5–7 days

    for shelves to refill after the pickets were lifted

    Reuters · AP · Il Messaggero · Coldiretti · Confcommercio Sicilia · Repubblica Napoli · Figisc · 15–24 Oct 2026

    Sicily: a fast lane for food, yet trucks stayed home

    “Since Friday, not a single crate. I accept nothing, because I wouldn’t know how to ship it.”

    Gino Pucci, trader at Vittoria market, Sicily · Il Post
    €90–100M

    lost by Sicily in five days: farms and food retail

    ≈500

    truck departures lost at Vittoria market alone

    What no one could answer the evening before

    Is the fast lane real on my route?

    a promise from the organisers is not a plan

    Which of my loads can go?

    perishables first, the rest can wait

    Go tonight, or wait?

    with no answer, the agencies kept their trucks home

    One message the evening before would have moved the produce.
    Il Post, 21 Oct 2026 (Vittoria) · Coldiretti and Confcommercio Sicilia · ≈500 = 100 trucks a day × 5 days

    AI agents keep watch, your dispatcher gets a WhatsApp

    1

    Watch

    Agents read truck bans, dosing calendars, closures, strikes, protests and blockades in seven countries, day and night. Official calendars are encoded as rules; news is read by AI.

    2

    Verify

    Every event keeps its source and a quote, and a person approves it before it can reach a dispatcher.

    3

    Match

    Each event is checked against tomorrow’s loads at every pass, tunnel, border and city, with EU driving-time rules and the exemptions for fresh food.

    4

    Alert

    Only when a load is hit: one WhatsApp message with the options and what each one costs.

    The message our working prototype produced for the Sicily stoppage, in Italian as the dispatcher reads it. The loads are invented; the event is real.

    Example built on the Sicily stoppage of 16–20 Oct 2026 (Il Post, Coldiretti). The loads are invented.
    Why a calendar is not enough

    At Kufstein, dosing starts at 05:00. The night ban ends at 05:00.

    A truck coming from Munich may not drive the Inntal motorway before the night ban lifts at 05:00, and at that minute the dosing begins. Leaving earlier does not help; telling the customer does. zhol checks the combination, not one rule at a time.

    Next official dosing days at Kufstein, southbound

    Wednesday 11, 18 and 25 November, 9 December 2026

    Land Tirol, Dosierkalender 2026 and Q1 2027 (official PDFs). 15 more days were added outside the calendar by August 2026.

    Sources: Land Tirol · WKO, Lkw-Fahrverbote in Österreich (Stand 10.08.2026)

    Who pays: traffic offices on international lanes

    Hauliers and forwarders with 6 to 100 trucks and weekly lanes abroad. The owner buys, the dispatcher who plans tomorrow uses it. Who exactly, and where to find them

    ≈5,250

    traffic offices in Italy to start: 26,260 hauliers with 6 to 100 vehicles × 1 in 5 on weekly lanes abroad

    Start: Lombardy, Veneto, Emilia-Romagna, Piemonte, with lanes to DE, AT, CH, FR, PL

    19,000+

    forwarding companies represented across Europe (CLECAT), before counting hauliers

    One avoided wait: 3 hours at the legal €100 an hour is €300 back to the office

    Why they will pay€800

    saved for every truck-day kept out of a picket, at the legal €100 an hour

    0

    apps to install: alerts arrive on WhatsApp, which offices already use

    What is one evening message worth to your office?
    Estimated saving €1,742 per month, €20,900 a year
    Avoided waits€1,200
    Dispatcher time€275
    Blockade and strike days€267
    Subscription€240 · 14% of savings
    Or: €49 + 15% of verified savings, capped€269
    Pays for itself in4 days

    Published calendar bans never count as savings: anyone can look them up for free.

    Albo Nazionale Autotrasporto, Q1 2025, via Rivista Tir and Shipping Italy · CLECAT · L. 105/2025 · 1 in 5 is our assumption, tested in interviews

    One team, from Kazakhstan, in Milan

    Alikhan, Inkara and Tomiris, friends since our first year at Bocconi: a team that understands each other with half a word. Now in Milan, next to the offices we build for. Zhol means road.

    Alikhan

    Customer discovery

    Interviews dispatchers and owners. Recruits the first offices.

    Inkara

    Workflow and prototype

    Matches events to loads. Designs review and confirmation.

    Tomiris

    Pilots and measurement

    Runs supervised cases. Tracks outcomes, time and costs.

    Next three weeks · by Workshop 2, 13 Nov
    8

    interviews with traffic offices

    2

    offices share their past loads

    2

    live tests on real restriction days

    The prototype already runs: 7 countries of truck-ban rules, the official Tyrol dosing calendar, matching, options with costs, WhatsApp delivery.

    Bocconi University · TEF Ignition 2026
    The beta is open

    Send us tomorrow’s loads. We tell you tonight which ones a restriction will hit.

    Four weeks, free, for traffic offices with lanes over the Alps. Every alert is checked by a person and cites its source.

    Join the betaSee it on real roads
    Illustration: a map on a desk with a truck route and three delivery cards, next to a red pencil
    First step with any office: review one recent disruption with a dispatcher and the owner, in 30 minutes.