DHL Global Forwarding & Freight (DGF), the Deutsche Post DHL air, ocean and road freightdivision, wants to become the overall world number one by focusing on profitable growth, emerging
markets, more productive operations and better customer service, according to its CEO.“DHL wants to grow and strengthen its market position with a stronger focus on profitablebusiness. Our ambition is to be the undisputed leader in ocean and air freight,” Roger Crook toldEuropean journalists at a media briefing on the sidelines of a major customer event in Berlin thisweek.
DGF is already the clear market leader in air freight where it is double the size of number twoDB Schenker in volume terms and ahead of Kuehne + Nagel and Panalpina. But in ocean freight ittrails market leader Kuehne + Nagel although it is significantly larger than DB Schenker andPanalpina, figures presented by DHL showed.
DGF’s strategy is to focus on profitable business in its core products, grow strongly inemerging markets, and improve its productivity and customer service, explained Crook, a former DHLExpress regional chief for the Americas and Asia Pacific. The division will focus both on globalmultinational companies and more SME customers. “We see expanding Asian companies as an opportunityfor growth as well,” he pointed out.
DGF has a strong presence in high-growth emerging markets, above all in Asia Pacific, Crookstressed. Asia generated 38% of its air freight export volumes in 2011, just behind Europe (39%)and well ahead of North America (16%) while South America represented 6%. In ocean freight, Asia(53%) was nearly twice as large as Europe (28%) while North America represented 12% of volumes.
The air and ocean forwarder is pinning great hopes on a major IT modernisation project termed “the New Forwarding Environment”. This will replace a fragmented landscape of different IT systemsthat are up to 30 years old in some cases with a new-generation SAP transport management systemenabling it to automate many more processes around the world.
“We want to move the company into the 21st century,” Crook commented. “Many of the features wehave in express we do not yet have in forwarding but we will in the future,” he pledged. “We wantto standardise and industrialise our processes much more, and improve the customer experience.”
For example, DGF will be able to provide customers with faster and better shipment information,including transit times, and offer online track and trace.
The new CRM is being trialled at present in four markets (Hong Kong/China, Belgium, Canada, NewZealand), will be rolled out in Asia initially and then worldwide by 2015.
