UPS has taken another step to expand its India business through a strategic alliance with leading domestic express operator First Flight Couriers.
UPS India announced yesterday that First Flight Courier Ltd. (FFCL) will become a UPS Authorised Shipping Outlet in India, expanding the reach of UPS’s international express delivery service through FFCL’s network in metropolitan and urban centres across the country.
With FFCL becoming a UPS Authorised Shipping Outlet, Indian customers will be able to book international shipments with FFCL, who will in turn make use of UPS’s global shipping network. This service expansion will support market growth by helping clients connect more quickly to global markets.
Established in 1986, First Flight Couriers has a network of 1,200 offices, 2,300 authorised collection centres and 450 franchisee locations across India, according to information on its website. Its customer base includes Indian firms and institutions, multinational corporations and e-commerce companies, for both domestic and international shipments.
“Demand for international express delivery service is on an upswing in India, with increasing penetration in cities and towns,” said Mark Martyn-Fisher, Managing Director of UPS India. “First Flight Couriers is a valuable ally and puts us in a strong position to support retail customers with their growing export-oriented requirements. We are glad to add First Flight Couriers to our team of global shipping partners who share our professional values and are proven to make the best use of innovative technologies to optimise trade between India and the rest of the world.”
O. P. Saboo, Chairman and Managing Director, First Flight Couriers, said: “Working with UPS will help us raise the bar of our service capabilities and offer our customers international reach. The combination of our respective networks, process know-how and operations expertise will allow us to offer an unprecedented level of convenience to our retail and enterprise customers.”
Explaining the background to the partnership, UPS said that rapid urbanisation will present a fair share of challenges and opportunities for businesses to explore new business models and supply chains. Today, half of the world’s population is concentrated in urban areas and, by the United Nations’ estimates, two-thirds of all people will live in cities by 2050.
UPS expects that this growth will usher in an influx of middle-class consumers, especially in emerging markets. The accompanying surge in demand for goods and services will create logistics-related and environmental challenges that will necessitate economically feasible and sustainable solutions. To support this growth in a more sustainable way, UPS regularly evaluates new routes and service offerings, based on customer demand and market opportunities.
In December UPS announced a last-mile logistics and delivery partnership with the start-up Connect India network to extend its services beyond major cities and urban centres in the fast-growing economy. Connect India, which operates through a network of Common Service Centers (government-backed Common Service Centers and entrepreneur-run Connect India Centers), is now a UPS Authorized Shipping Outlet (ASO). Together they form a last-mile delivery network covering more than 50 cities, 650 district towns and 8000 small towns in semi-urban and rural areas across the sub-continent.
The region comprising over 70 countries that covers the Indian subcontinent, the Middle East and Africa is UPS’s largest region in terms of geographic area and forms a key part of the UPS global network. UPS began its services in India in 1988 and has since grown to become a convenient resource to India’s businesses for their express delivery services.
