Still think there's no money in transportation management systems? Market analyst ARC Advisory Group projects that TMS sales will top $950 million this year, driven by companies anxious to obtain visibility into financial performance as it relates to logistics. That's 4.4 percent above the $910 million in sales recorded in 2004, the last year for which data are available.

It seems TMS vendors have Sarbanes-Oxley to thank for some of that growth. ARC analysts speculate that the need to comply with the Sarbanes-Oxley Act (SOA) has driven many chief financial officers to take a closer look at logistics and its impact on financial performance. In many cases, they're finding their companies don't have a clear picture of their total transportation costs and are turning to TMS to sort things out.