PTDo smart contracts improve road freight?
Contracts that carry themselves out, in code, promise less paperwork and more trust. The thesis heard from 10 managers and then 126 road freight carriers to see whether using these contracts changes the link between being part of a logistics ecosystem, transaction costs and performance. Explained in 12 screens.
Four ideas and one question
Roads carry about 65% of Brazil’s freight, and the country ranked 51st of 139 in the World Bank’s 2023 Logistics Performance Index. The thesis asks whether the smart contract changes the link between the logistics ecosystem, transaction costs and performance. Tap a block or an arrow:
Model from Figure 1 and hypotheses H1 to H5 (section 2.5.1). Sector figures cited in the introduction (Brazil’s National Transport Confederation and the 2023 Logistics Performance Index).
A contract that carries itself out
A smart contract is a program: the clauses become rules of the kind “if this happens, do that”. When an event comes in, the contract runs and records everything on a blockchain, a shared record that no one can change alone. Choose what happened to a delivery:
On paper
With a smart contract
The idea of a smart contract comes from sections 2.2 to 2.2.2 (a program that runs when an event is triggered, with no intermediary, recorded on a blockchain). The quote about renegotiating is from manager P1 (section 4.2.3.2). The rules and the delivery are our examples.
First ten conversations, then 126 questionnaires
The study uses mixed methods. A literature review gave the basis for the questions; ten managers answered open questions, which were used to adjust the questionnaire; and carriers from across the country answered that questionnaire, with scores from 1 to 5. Tap each stage:
For managers, a transaction cost is a surprise expense
Ten carrier managers (directors, managers and coordinators, all men) answered in writing between February and April 2024. Not all of them used smart contracts, and some left questions blank. Choose a topic and tap a person:
Quotes from section 4.2.3, translated by us from Portuguese (with […] for cuts), identified only by the thesis code. Roles from Tables 10 and 11. The thesis does not link each manager to one of the companies in Tables 12 and 13, and neither do we.
Of the 37 questions in the three blocks, 16 stayed in the model
Each idea became a block of sentences, scored from 1 (disagree) to 5 (agree). In the analysis, only the questions that measured their block well were kept. Switch the view and tap a column to read the questions:
Height = number of questions. Questionnaire in Appendix C; questions kept and factor loadings from Table 15 and Figure 7. The smart contract was a moderator; the thesis does not say how many of its 13 questions were kept.
126 carriers, almost nine in ten from the South and Southeast
The questionnaire went to 1,512 companies doing medium- and long-distance road freight, between June and October 2024. 134 replies came back, and 126 were complete. Those who answered were usually a manager or director at a large, well-established company. Switch the breakdown:
Charts 15 to 30 (section 4.3.1). Response rate of 8.86% of emails, according to the thesis. No replies came from the states of Rio Grande do Norte, Sergipe, Paraíba, Maranhão, Acre, Roraima and Amapá, or from the Federal District.
One dot per reply; the order of the dots is only for reading.
Smart contracts show up above all in transport management
Companies ticked the activities in which they use smart contracts and scored eight reasons for using them from 1 to 5. Before seeing the scores, a guess: which reason got the lowest score?
All 126 companies said they use smart contracts
The questionnaire had a “do not use” option. In the conversation with the ten managers, three said they do not work with smart contracts. Before seeing, a guess: of the 126 companies in the questionnaire, how many ticked “do not use”?
Our reading: the question said “Smart Contract (Digital Technologies)”, and the thesis says that Ethereum, the platform ticked by 113 companies, was created in 2015. In 2024, nobody could have used it for more than 10 years, yet 21 companies ticked that range. Some managers may have read the question as the use of digital technology in general. The thesis does not discuss this point.
The 10 managers in the conversation
The 126 companies in the questionnaire
Charts 29 and 30 and Appendix C (the “do not use” option appeared in the smart-contract questions). The three managers who said they do not use it are P4, P6 and P8 (section 4.2.3.4). Hollow red dot = said they do not use it.
Switching on the smart contract did not change the links
The main hypothesis was one of moderation: the more a company uses smart contracts, the stronger the links between ecosystem, costs and performance would become. Switch the contract on and off and compare the illustration of the hypothesis with what the data showed:
Figure 4 (initial model, with the smart contract as moderator). A p above 0.05 means the effect cannot be told apart from chance. Since none of the three moderations was confirmed (H4a, H4b and H4c), the author removed the contract from the model (screen 11).
The arrows would thicken with the contract
The arrows stay the same
In the illustration, the change in thickness is made up. In the data panel, the arrows have the thickness of the initial model’s coefficients and do not change, because no moderation was significant. In that initial model, the direct arrow from ecosystem to performance also had no clear effect (0.107, p = 0.604).
Without the contract in the model, the ecosystem is what matters
Those who say they are more integrated into the logistics ecosystem also say they pay more attention to transaction costs and report better performance. Attention to costs is not clearly linked to performance, so it does not bridge the two. Tap an arrow:
Standardised coefficients (β) and p from Figure 9 and Table 7; R² from Table 9. Thickness ∝ β; dashed arrow = no clear effect (p > 0.05). R² = how much of the differences between companies the model explains.
Integration between partners mattered more than the tool
For the author, the logistics ecosystem is central to carriers’ performance; the smart contract, which did not change the links here, should be studied in other settings, such as other modes of transport.
For carriers
- Being integrated into the ecosystem (partners, customers, logistics 4.0) is what went with performance; using smart contracts did not change that link.
- Eight of the ten managers in the conversation said that handling digital technology means training people to analyse data and decide.
For those considering smart contracts
- Managers mention gains in traceability, trust and fewer errors, and also risks: rule changes, data leaks and technical complexity.
- Legal rules change from one region to another, some managers note, which matters when operating in several countries.
For research
- The author suggests studies by region of the country, by type of service and in other modes of transport (air, rail and water).
- He also suggests looking for other paths between the ecosystem and performance, such as information technology and the quality of management.
What this research does not say
- A convenience sample. One round of data collection, an 8.86% response rate and eight states with no reply; results may not hold for the whole country. · according to the author
- It is all respondents’ views. Performance and costs were 1-to-5 scores given by the manager, at one point in time, not company figures. · our observation
- “Transaction cost” means attention to costs. The questions kept are about analysing, sharing and tracking these costs, not how much the company spends. · our observation, Appendix C
- No companies that do not use it. Since all of them said they use smart contracts, there is no comparison group of users and non-users. · our observation
- Ecosystem and costs move very closely together. The overlap measure (HTMT 0.829) came close to the 0.85 limit the thesis itself adopts. · our observation, Table 12
Credits
BILLIG, Osvaldo Alencar de Oliveira. O impacto do contrato inteligente (smart contract) na relação entre o ecossistema logístico e o desempenho logístico no contexto dos custos de transação. Doctoral thesis (Business Administration), Mackenzie Presbyterian University, São Paulo, 2025. Advisor: Prof. Dr. Gilberto Perez.
Thesis approved on 6 February 2025, written in Mackenzie’s inter-institutional doctorate (DINTER) with Centro Universitário Dinâmica das Cataratas. Data analysed in SmartPLS. This version simplifies the work for a general audience.