Amazon to Deliver Air-Cargo Flights -- WSJ
16 Mars 2017 - 8:02AM
Dow Jones News
China-based sellers will be able to ship their goods by plane;
'wake-up call' for rivals
By Laura Stevens and Erica E. Phillips
Amazon.com Inc. has developed a business to handle shipments for
its sellers by land and by sea -- and soon by air.
The Seattle-based retail giant is planning to offer its sellers
in China the ability to fly their goods internationally as air
cargo, according to an Amazon Logistics site.
The move is an expansion of Amazon's growing business as a
global freight forwarder and third-party logistics company, putting
it more directly in competition with companies like United Parcel
Service Inc. and Deutsche Post AG's DHL. In recent months, Amazon
began handling the shipment of goods by ocean to its U.S.
warehouses from Chinese merchants selling on its site, taking on a
role it had previously left to global freight-transportation
companies.
Amazon's entry into the market is "a huge wake-up call to an
industry that's been very slow to adopt technology," said Ryan
Petersen, chief executive of Flexport Inc., a San Francisco-based
startup freight-forwarder that uses software to scrub
inefficiencies from the process of arranging international cargo
shipments for small- and midsize companies.
Amazon's offerings vary by country, a spokeswoman said. "In
China, we offer Amazon Logistics+ to provide operational support to
companies of all sizes," she said.
The site outlines a corner of how Amazon is pushing forward in
its plans, outlined in a September article in The Wall Street
Journal, to one day haul and deliver packages and cargo for others
as well as itself.
Amazon has recently detailed plans to build an air cargo hub in
the U.S. and has said it would lease 40 cargo jets. The company has
said that it needs to build out its delivery business to ensure the
ability to deliver the growing amount of merchandise its customers
order.
In China, it is unclear whether Amazon would be booking airspace
via other carriers or flying its own planes.
The Amazon Logistics site focuses on Chinese customers, who are
sellers on its site as well as other businesses. The site says it
offers end-to-end one-stop ocean freight services. As for
airfreight, "we currently are developing this service and plan to
quickly introduce it to a large number of our sellers," the site
says.
Amazon can do pickups, warehousing, line-haul transportation,
delivery, as well as handle import and export needs, the site says.
Primary delivery destinations include the U.S., Europe and
Japan.
"Our solution provides a world-class service offering," Amazon
says on the site. "As part of one of the world's leading e-commerce
companies, our operations team has strong experience in providing
professional logistics solutions. With our own strong logistics
volume, we can reduce your operational costs."
Many traditional freight forwarders still conduct their business
via phone, email or even fax machine, but Amazon's entrance into
the sector could drive shippers away from that method in favor of a
user-friendly technology platform. Mr. Petersen said at least one
of his firm's customers has used Amazon's service -- now a direct
competitor to Flexport's technology -- to arrange an ocean freight
shipment.
"You can't just put your head down in the sand and pretend that
change is not going to come," Mr. Petersen said.
Write to Laura Stevens at laura.stevens@wsj.com and Erica E.
Phillips at erica.phillips@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
March 16, 2017 02:47 ET (06:47 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2017 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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