France’s La Poste has broadened its e-commerce portfolio by buying specialist firm Orium while areport has called for up to 5,000 new jobs at the group to ease social tensions after several
suicides over the last year.The postal group yesterday announced the acquisition of e-fulfilment firm Orium, which has 200staff and revenues of some €20 million. This would extend the e-commerce offering of its logisticssubsidiary Neolog, which offers a wide range of services for e-tailers, retailers and brands, makesover 5,000 daily deliveries and had turnover of €307 million in 2011.
Founded in 2004, Orium provides logistics and fulfillment services that diversify sales channelsand has international fulfillment sites in France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Germany, Switzerland andthe UK. With clients such as Nespresso, Smartbox, Wanimo, Nuxe, Pierre Fabre, Marie Claire, OrangeMaine and Sojeans, the company differentiates itself by offering cross-channel strategy for orderfulfillment, shipping and transport, and call centre services.
Together, Neolog and Orium now offer a unique network of 18 European warehouse and distributioncentres, a powerful IT system (Reflex WMS), a European contact centre, extensive transportsolutions and an organisation which can be adapted to suit the needs of every type of client, LaPoste stated.
Stephanie Sentis, President of Neolog and Orium, said: “This agreement will pave the way fornumerous traditional retailers hoping to access the potential of the Internet with a trustedprovider capable of implementing B2B and B2C logistics with the same level of performance andexpertise. Our industrial tool allows us to adapt the profiles of our clients, from SMEs to largeretailers.”
Oliver Moreau, founder and managing director of Orium, added: “The e-commerce market is aresponse to a customer-focused culture, for which logistics providers aren’t always prepared. LeGroupe La Poste is the natural leader and will be able to support innovation for retailers ande-tailers. This agreement will allow us to continue our development strategy with a trulyinternational network.”
La Poste has gradually built up its e-commerce value chain activities over the last few years.In April this year it bought e-commerce services firm Mixcommerce and announced the creation of anew e-commerce unit to drive growth in this segment. Its services include website development,online and offline sales development, payment solutions, stock management, order preparation,delivery solutions and international development in direct marketing, transport and internationalparcel delivery.
Meanwhile, La Poste has also published a report into working conditions for postal staffconducted after three workplace suicides late last year and early this year. The Kaspar Report,conducted by former union leader Jean Kaspar, called for more attention to be paid to employeewelfare and human relations and to ease hiring restrictions while supporting the company’s effortsto make the workforce more flexible.
Presenting the 69-page report to French media, Kaspar called on La Poste to take on some 4,000 –5,000 additional staff “to ease social tensions” and to improve staff training. La Poste has notyet responded to the report’s conclusions and recommendations.
