Poland’s largest independent postal and parcels group Integer.pl has launched a joint-venturecompany to spearhead the ambitious worldwide rollout programme for its ‘easyPack by InPost’
automated parcel terminal product.The establishment of ‘easyPack’ as a company, jointly owned by Integer.pl Group and AsterinaInvestments, part of private-equity group PineBridge Investments, follows clearance late last monthfrom Poland’s Office of Competition and Customer Protection (UOKiK). Integer.pl will make a cashand capital investment of €58 million over two years, while PineBridge Investments will provide aninvestment of €50 million, to finance the plan to roll out 16,000 parcel terminals across Europeand the CIS by 2016.
Integer.pl said it was planning to spend PLZ40-80 million (€9.8-€19.6 million) on thedevelopment of the ‘easyPack by InPost’ machines up to the end of 2012, and that its five-yearinternational expansion project was valued at around €300 million. It expects that Integer.pl grouprevenue from its foreign projects will reach €20-40 million per year over the next few years.
Several hundred easyPack terminals are already operating in Poland, Russia, and Estonia and anumber of other countries have also ordered or already received terminals, including Lithuania,Latvia, Spain, Ireland, Cyprus, Chile, and Saudi Arabia. Following the agreement with PineBridgeInvestments, Integer.pl Group plans to deploy 1,000 new easyPack machines by the end of 2012,including 300 in Poland, 400 in Russia, 200 in Ukraine, and more than 100 in the Czech Republic andSlovakia.
From next year, it plans to ramp up the production and distribution of the terminals further,with the addition of 3,000 machines in 2013 to a mixture of customers in the UK, two Scandinaviancountries, Croatia, Slovenia and Belgium.
A further 2,500 machines are due to be added across Europe in 2014, and another 2,500 machinesin 2015. The company said a further 4,000 machines will be held in reserve by the Integer.pl Groupto be installed in different countries, according to market demand.
In Poland, where InPost also operates as a national delivery company, InPost now delivers around10,000 parcels a day to its 420 easyPack terminals across the country. However, outside of Poland,CEP-Research understands that the business model would be to use a carrier-neutral system, withcourier companies delivering to nearby hubs of a third-party delivery firm, which would feedparcels to and from the automated consolidation points.
Integer said it was putting together an international team to manage the expansion of the group’s e-commerce-related businesses, and had appointed Jan Tar as its COO. Describing him as “ahigh-class specialist in the field of service quality management”, the company said he would beresponsible for the “acquisition and preparation of easyPack locations in Poland and abroad, andthe new implementations, as well as the comprehensive support and consumer service”.
The company said: “The dynamic global expansion of easyPack by InPost requires us to expand thepart of the company responsible for the international contacts and self-service parcel machinesimplementing.”
A graduate of the Executive MBA programme at London Business School (LBS), HEC Paris, and NHHNorwegian School of Economics, Tar has more than 19 years’ experience in retail, serviceoperations, as well as HR management, in the field of sales projects, franchising, and customerservice in several major international institutions, namely Statoil, Texaco, Amoco, Metro Group andPepsiCo.
