Boots was referring to the company’s strategic move from parcels to freight in Asia, its considerable investments in infrastructure, particularly the Asia road network, enhanced Europe-Southeast Asia-China connectivity via its own 747- 400 freighter, and award-winning levels of customer service.
All of these initiatives, especially those over the last 15 months, said Boots, resulted in regional growth in the 30-40 percent range in 2008, with 20 percent expansion recorded so far in 2009 and growth likely to continue at healthy levels for the rest of the year. “We may not be the largest but we are very, very focused, and we continue to take market share from competitors.â€Â
In the current economic environment, explained Boots, customers will trade off speed and cost, and what TNT has done in Asia through highly efficient and integrated logistics networks, is configure a low cost, affordable solutions that appeal to customers.
TNT’s investment in its Asia road network, which now provides a link to China via Vietnam, paid off particularly well in 2008, a year when many customers turned to the road as jet fuel prices hit new highs, and notably in December when Bangkok’s airport was closed for several days.
Looking forward to 2009, Boots announced that there would be further investments in hubs and depots, including plans to connect Cambodia, as well as security and customer services. Also underway is a major foray into service logistics – repairs, returns, etc – which has a total market size of 410 million euros (US$532 million ) in Southeast Asia alone. The company is also investigating ways in which it can take its low cost, flexible network model to India, said Boots.