Flying at high speeds. Kuehne + Nagel, a worldwide logistics provider, has signed an agreement to design and implement a lead logistics global supply chain solution with Connexion by Boeing (CBB). CBB is a high-speed information service provider to the commercial airline, maritime and business aviation industries, whose services include supplying Internet services to airline passengers. Lead Logistics Solutions, a Kuehne + Nagel business, will provide CBB with full supply chain management services, including warehousing and distribution, inventory management and global transportation management.
Load 'em up. Lakeside Logistics, a third-party logistics service provider headquartered in Oakville, Ontario, is implementing Prophesy's ShipperPLUS load-builder software. ShipperPLUS is an optimization tool that will take Lakeside's client data and determine the most effective transportation plan.
Building a relationship. Owens Corning has extended its business relationship with Ryder System. Ryder already provides the building materials manufacturer with full-service leasing. It will now add dedicated contract carriage services. These services include drivers for its vehicles, fleet management and vehicle maintenance.
Fit for print. Unisource Worldwide Inc., an independent marketer and distributor of paper, packaging systems and facility supplies, will outsource its inbound logistics management within the United States to Transplace. Transplace will supply a complete suite of logistics management technology and services, including shipment planning, carrier selection, carrier management and shipment status reporting, and freight bill audit and payment.
Peak support. Zebra Technologies has named Peak Technologies as an authorized XML Printer Specialist in support of SAP's Auto-ID Infrastructure and Oracle's RFID and Sensor-based Services. Peak, an RR Donnelley company, is a value-added reseller and provider of automatic identification and data collection solutions, and enterprise mobility solutions and services.
Portable medicine chests. Osco Drug Stores has purchased some 80,000 FlapNest 2115 totes from IPL. The new totes feature added reinforcement on corners, lids and other stress areas where weaker totes often break. The totes are designed to save money, reduce injuries and improve product security.
Letter-perfect sorting. Express and delivery company DHL has awarded a major contract to Siemens Logistics and Assembly Systems for conveying and sorting systems to be used in DHL's new letter and parcel sortation hubs located in Ohio, Pennsylvania and California. Also included is upper-level management software for the systems. The new DHL facilities are due to begin operations by September of next year.
Technology to go. Paxar Corp. and Psion Teklogix have teamed up to deliver mobile computing solutions to the retail supply chain market. Paxar has joined the Ascent Partner Program and will resell Psion Teklogix's line of rugged mobile computing devices integrated with Paxar's Monarch line of mobile and tabletop printers, supplies and RFID printing/encoding products.
Psion Teklogix also announced that 3663 First for Foodservice, a food-service supplier in the United Kingdom, is implementing its TekSpeech voice system in its distribution network.
Seeing Red. RedPrairie has inked several deals with new customers. Cabot Creamery, a farmer-owned dairy cooperative and cheese producer in Vermont, will use RedPrairie's warehouse management and Commander/QA Recall solutions, as well as its visibility, supplier management and report writing applications.
Longs Drug Stores has just purchased RedPrairie's workforce management solution to help schedule its workforce. Longs has 472 drug stores on the West Coast and Hawaii.
South of the border, Almacenadora Mercader, a Mexican grain distributor and third-party logistics provider, has implemented RedPrairie's warehouse management solution for improved inventory control.
A sure bet. Procter & Gamble has selected Exel to operate the co-packing and product customization site in its new Canadian Distribution Centre in Brantford, Ontario. The facility's customization area handles assembly of in-store displays and promotional packaging. Operations are due to begin there in October.
Flying high. Aviation electronics company Rockwell Collins has selected MCA Solutions' Service Planning and Optimization software suite. The software will be used to optimize Rockwell Collins's global service parts network. The company aims to optimize inventory at more than 60 service centers that support governments, aircraft manufacturers and 400 airlines around the globe.
The German forklift vendor Kion Group plans to lay off an unspecified number of workers as part of an “efficiency program” it is launching to strengthen the company’s resilience and maintain headroom for future investments, the company said today.
The new structural measures are intended to optimize Kion’s efficiency, executives said in their fourth quarter earnings report.
“While internal programs to continuously improve product, production, and services costs were already up and running throughout 2024 and will continue, further structural measures will address a more efficient setup for Kion in Europe. This is expected to have an impact on personnel requirements subject to consultations with the respective employee representative bodies as required by local laws,” the report said.
“The efficiency program is addressing developments in the macroeconomic environment. European economies are struggling to gain momentum – this affects key customer industries in the Industrial Trucks & Services segment, where Chinese competitors have been improving their market position in the aftermaths of the recent pandemics,” Kion said.
The move comes as Kion reported that it finished its 2024 financial year with slightly improved revenue of $11.9 billion (over $11.8 billion in 2023), and profitability (measured as earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT)) that significantly increased to $951 million (over $820 million in 2023).
The company now plans to pay $249 to $269 million in financial year 2025 to implement the cost saving measures. Following that one-time charge, it expects to achieve sustainable cost savings of $145 million to $166 million per year, beginning in 2026.
“In order to maintain headroom for investments ensuring our future, to further strengthen our competitiveness and our resilience, we must manage our cost base. This requires structural and sustainable measures,” Christian Harm, CFO of Kion, said in a release.
By the numbers, fourth quarter shipment volume was down 4.7% compared to the prior quarter, while spending dropped 2.2%.
Geographically, fourth-quarter shipment volume was low across all regions. The Northeast had the smallest decline at 1.2% with the West just behind with a contraction of 2.1%. And the Southeast saw shipments drop 6.7%, the most of all regions, as hurricanes impacted freight activity.
“While this quarter’s Index revealed spending overall on truck freight continues to decline, we did see some signs that spending per truck is increasing,” said Bobby Holland, U.S. Bank director of freight business analytics. “Shipments falling more than spending – even with lower fuel surcharges – suggests tighter capacity.”
The U.S. Bank Freight Payment Index measures quantitative changes in freight shipments and spend activity based on data from transactions processed through U.S. Bank Freight Payment, which processes more than $43 billion in freight payments annually for shippers and carriers across the U.S.
“It’s clear there are both cyclical and structural challenges remaining as we look for a truck freight market reboot,” Bob Costello, senior vice president and chief economist at the American Trucking Associations (ATA) said in a release on the results. “For instance, factory output softness – which has a disproportionate impact on truck freight volumes – is currently weighing heavily on our industry.”
Volvo Autonomous Solutions will form a strategic partnership with autonomous driving technology and generative AI provider Waabi to jointly develop and deploy autonomous trucks, with testing scheduled to begin later this year.
The announcement came two weeks after autonomous truck developer Kodiak Robotics said it had become the first company in the industry to launch commercial driverless trucking operations. That milestone came as oil company Atlas Energy Solutions Inc. used two RoboTrucks—which are semi-trucks equipped with the Kodiak Driver self-driving system—to deliver 100 loads of fracking material on routes in the Permian Basin in West Texas and Eastern New Mexico.
Atlas now intends to scale up its RoboTruck deployment “considerably” over the course of 2025, with multiple RoboTruck deployments expected throughout the year. In support of that, Kodiak has established a 12-person office in Odessa, Texas, that is projected to grow to approximately 20 people by the end of Q1 2025.
Businesses dependent on ocean freight are facing shipping delays due to volatile conditions, as the global average trip for ocean shipments climbed to 68 days in the fourth quarter compared to 60 days for that same quarter a year ago, counting time elapsed from initial booking to clearing the gate at the final port, according to E2open.
Those extended transit times and booking delays are the ripple effects of ongoing turmoil at key ports that is being caused by geopolitical tensions, labor shortages, and port congestion, Dallas-based E2open said in its quarterly “Ocean Shipping Index” report.
The most significant contributor to the year-over-year (YoY) increase is actual transit time, alongside extraordinary volatility that has created a complex landscape for businesses dependent on ocean freight, the report found.
"Economic headwinds, geopolitical turbulence and uncertain trade routes are creating unprecedented disruptions within the ocean shipping industry. From continued Red Sea diversions to port congestion and labor unrest, businesses face a complex landscape of obstacles, all while grappling with possibility of new U.S. tariffs," Pawan Joshi, chief strategy officer (CSO) at e2open, said in a release. "We can expect these ongoing issues will be exacerbated by the Lunar New Year holiday, as businesses relying on Asian suppliers often rush to place orders, adding strain to their supply chains.”
Lunar New Year this year runs from January 29 to February 8, and often leads to supply chain disruptions as massive worker travel patterns across Asia leads to closed factories and reduced port capacity.
Women are significantly underrepresented in the global transport sector workforce, comprising only 12% of transportation and storage workers worldwide as they face hurdles such as unfavorable workplace policies and significant gender gaps in operational, technical and leadership roles, a study from the World Bank Group shows.
This underrepresentation limits diverse perspectives in service design and decision-making, negatively affects businesses and undermines economic growth, according to the report, “Addressing Barriers to Women’s Participation in Transport.” The paper—which covers global trends and provides in-depth analysis of the women’s role in the transport sector in Europe and Central Asia (ECA) and Middle East and North Africa (MENA)—was prepared jointly by the World Bank Group, the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the German Agency for International Cooperation (GIZ), the European Investment Bank (EIB), and the International Transport Forum (ITF).
The slim proportion of women in the sector comes at a cost, since increasing female participation and leadership can drive innovation, enhance team performance, and improve service delivery for diverse users, while boosting GDP and addressing critical labor shortages, researchers said.
To drive solutions, the researchers today unveiled the Women in Transport (WiT) Network, which is designed to bring together transport stakeholders dedicated to empowering women across all facets and levels of the transport sector, and to serve as a forum for networking, recruitment, information exchange, training, and mentorship opportunities for women.
Initially, the WiT network will cover only the Europe and Central Asia and the Middle East and North Africa regions, but it is expected to gradually expand into a global initiative.
“When transport services are inclusive, economies thrive. Yet, as this joint report and our work at the EIB reveal, few transport companies fully leverage policies to better attract, retain and promote women,” Laura Piovesan, the European Investment Bank (EIB)’s Director General of the Projects Directorate, said in a release. “The Women in Transport Network enables us to unite efforts and scale impactful solutions - benefiting women, employers, communities and the climate.”