Freight Brokerages Are Switching

Why agent-model brokerages are
leaving legacy TMS.

Turvo, MercuryGate, and AscendTMS were built for a different era — enterprise contracts, manual workflows, and bolted-on AI. HatchOS delivers per-seat economics, seven AI employees, and a 14-day go-live. Here's where the gap actually is.

No contracts. No setup fees. No sales call required for pricing.

$199–299
Per seat / month
14 days
Time to deploy
7 AI
Employees included
0
Annual contracts
Feature Comparison

The table speaks for itself

Every row sourced from published pricing pages and verified feature documentation. Last updated May 2026.

Feature HatchOS Turvo MercuryGate AscendTMS
Pricing & Contract
Starting price $199/seat/mo $3,500–$8,000/mo
enterprise contract
$2,500–$6,000/mo
enterprise contract
$1,500–$4,000/mo
annual required
True per-seat pricing No platform fee Flat minimum Flat minimum Partial
Setup / onboarding fees None Additional costs Additional costs Additional
Annual contract required No — month-to-month Yes Yes Yes
AI Capabilities
AI employees (built-in, named roles) 7 — Dash, Mark, Lena, Rex, Shield, Knox, Hatch No No No
Autonomous carrier outreach Built in No No No
Native email tender extraction Auto-parse Via Vooma No No
AI compliance screening (FMCSA) Native Shield AI Via Highway No No
AI-powered CRM insights Lena AI No No No
Architecture
Multi-tenant isolation DB-layer enforced Configurable Configurable No
White-label platform Full No No No
Built-in training academy 23 modules + sandbox No No Basic
Carrier self-onboarding portal Built in No No No
Financial Operations
Agent commission splits (per-seat) Auto-calculated Not native Not native Not native
Vendor payables + factor routing Native ACH + True COGS Via RoadSync Basic No
Commission period close (margin lock) One-click lock No No No
Platform & Integration
Open API (full access) REST + webhooks Limited Basic Basic
Time to deploy (go-live) 14 days 6–8 weeks min; 1yr reported 4–8 weeks 2–6 weeks

Sources: Turvo.com pricing page, G2/Capterra reviews 2026, MercuryGate.com, AscendTMS.com. HatchOS pricing at hatchos.polsia.app/pricing.

What AI Actually Looks Like

7 AI employees vs. a chatbot sidebar

Legacy TMS products call a single AI copilot "AI-powered." HatchOS runs seven dedicated AI workers — each with domain context, autonomous execution, and accountability built in.

Dash
Dispatch Operations
Monitors load board gaps, auto-notifies agents of capacity shortfalls, and drafts tender responses in under 60 seconds.
Legacy TMS: Manual board watching. Agents flag gaps by eye.
📊
Mark
Finance & Settlements
Catches margin compression in real time, flags anomalous carrier charges, and generates period-close settlement packages.
Legacy TMS: Finance reviews spreadsheets after the fact. No real-time signals.
💬
Lena
CRM & Customer Relations
Drafts account emails, surfaces at-risk customers from engagement patterns, and tracks outbound sequences across all contacts.
Legacy TMS: Manual email drafting. No engagement scoring. No sequence tracking.
🛡
Shield
Compliance & Carrier Verification
Runs FMCSA authority checks, insurance expiry monitoring, and double-broker pattern detection — on every carrier engagement, automatically.
Legacy TMS: Manual FMCSA lookups. Compliance left to agents.
📋
Rex
Reporting & Analytics
Answers natural-language questions about load trends, revenue per lane, and agent performance — no report builder required.
Legacy TMS: Static report exports. No natural-language query.
📞
Knox
Carrier Relations
Manages inbound carrier communication, routes rate confirmations, and handles broker-carrier agreement renewals end-to-end.
Legacy TMS: Phone and email. No structured carrier communication workflow.
🤖
Hatch AI
Copilot & All-Module Chat
Central AI chat layer across all modules — answers questions, drafts emails, summarizes load history, and suggests next actions inline.
Legacy TMS: Context switch between modules. No cross-module AI assistance.
Migration Playbooks

Coming from one of these?

We built migration playbooks for each platform. Each covers what moves automatically, what needs manual work, and what the parallel-run window looks like.

Turvo's minimum $5,000/month and multi-year contracts hit hardest at growth-stage brokerages. The migration playbooks cover EDI 204/214/990 transfer, load history import, carrier scorecard mapping, and your existing Augment/Vooma replacement path.

  • EDI carrier connections transfer automatically
  • Load history migrates in structured format
  • Parallel-run window — no ops blackout
  • 14-day concierge migration included
Talk to migration →

MercuryGate's architecture makes multi-tenant and white-label difficult to configure. HatchOS replaces your existing dispatch stack with structured data migration for customers, carriers, shipment history, and factor routing configurations.

  • Customer and carrier database structured export
  • Active shipments mapped to new platform
  • Factor routing config transferred
  • Agent accounts and roles migrated
Talk to migration →

AscendTMS works well for small shops but breaks down at agent-model brokerages with multi-office structures and commission automation needs. HatchOS migration covers your carrier list, customer accounts, and active load pipeline — with per-agent commission structure preserved.

  • Carrier and customer import via CSV/API
  • Load history export and re-import
  • Commission contract templates preserved
  • Fastest go-live path at 14 days
Talk to migration →
"
HatchOS gave us back our time. We went from 40-hour weeks managing spreadsheets and chasing carriers manually to having Dash handle the board and Rex surface the numbers. That's the difference — the AI does the work, not just describe it.
Hatchway Trade Group — 898 loads managed, 52% faster cycle time, $1.17M revenue
898
Loads managed
52%
Faster cycle time
$1.17M
Revenue
Common Questions

Before you decide

HatchOS charges per seat — $199–$299/month depending on plan. Turvo charges $3,500–$8,000/month flat minimum, plus setup, training, and migration fees on top. For a 15-agent team, HatchOS costs roughly 40% of Turvo's floor with no hidden fees and no annual contract.
HatchOS uses a structured parallel-run migration process: your existing TMS stays live while we populate HatchOS with your carrier database, customer accounts, load history, and active shipments. The cutover is scheduled — not forced. Your team keeps dispatching throughout.
14 days to first load in HatchOS. Our concierge migration team handles the technical setup. Every seat gets access to HatchOS Bootcamp — 23 modules across dispatch, CRM, finance, compliance, and AI tools. Growth and Scale plans also include a training sandbox where agents practice with realistic seed data before touching production.
All plans include email and in-app support. Growth adds priority response. Scale adds a dedicated customer success manager and SLA guarantee. Migration support is included — we don't charge for the onboarding process.
HatchOS supports EDI 204, 214, 990, and 210 — the same set used by Turvo and MercuryGate. Existing EDI carrier relationships transfer without renegotiation. The EDI integration is native to the platform, not a separate vendor contract.
Yes. The parallel-run migration lets you start HatchOS while your existing TMS contract runs out. We time the cutover to your contract end date — you don't pay for two platforms simultaneously. Our migration playbook includes a contract-end checklist to ensure nothing gets missed.
Yes. HatchOS supports custom factor routing — configure your existing factoring relationship in Settings → Factors, assign factors per carrier or per shipment, and run settlements through your current factor without changing your banking setup. No lock-in with any specific factor.