FORWARDERS continue to build air freight capacity on the trans-Pacific trade lane in support of fast-growing e-commerce demand from the US, with DHL Express the latest carrier to add lift capacity out of Asia this year.
DHL Express will increase its available capacity by close to 30 per cent with the addition of a Boeing 777 freighter to a route linking Sydney, Singapore, Ho Chi Minh, and Nagoya with the parcel carrier's US hub in Cincinnati, reports IHS Media.
'We continue seeing strong express logistics services demand between intra-Asia and the US,' Ken Lee, CEO of DHL Express Asia Pacific, said in a statement. 'With Vietnam's continued rise as a manufacturing hub for semiconductors, garments accessories and materials, as well as electronics, we see an increasing demand for our service.'
The new DHL Express service will use a dedicated freighter operated by Kalitta Air that increases the weekly payload by 27 per cent to 940 tonnes, with 102 tonnes a week offered to shippers in Vietnam.
Ongoing pandemic-related travel restrictions have kept most passenger flights on the trade lanes connecting Asia with North and South America firmly on the ground, removing the crucial scheduled belly cargo capacity around which forwarders traditionally built their networks. The cuts in belly capacity have coincided with sharp increases in e-commerce and rising demand from shippers trying to circumvent ocean congestion that is delaying imports from Asia, with forwarders turning to chartered capacity in record numbers.
DHL Express joins forwarders Kuehne + Nagel, which later this year will deploy two chartered B747-8Fs on the trans-Pacific; Alibaba's logistics unit Cainiao, which has chartered one B747-8F on the trade lane; and Flexport, which will deploy two chartered B777Fs between Chicago and Hong Kong in a multi-year charter deal with Eastern Air. Much of the chartered space will be dedicated to serving the high-volume e-commerce demand.
Edoardo Podesta, the Hong Kong-based COO for air and sea logistics at Dachser, said recently that customers were looking for capability from their forwarders that went beyond commercial capacity.
'We will of course continue to sign BSAs [block space agreements] and rely on commercial capacity, but for our strategic and densest routes we will keep and extend our network of charters,' he said. 'In the future, having your own capacity will be an important criterion in the selection of logistics service providers, and this must be considered as well.'
Additional air freight capacity is needed on the Vietnam-US routes after total trade between the two countries reached more than US$111 billion in 2021, an increase of nearly $21 billion compared with 2020, according to DHL. In 2021, Vietnam's exports to the US reached $96.29 billion, a 24.9 per cent year-over-year increase, with the US accounting for 28.6 per cent of Vietnam's exports by value.
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DHL Express will increase its available capacity by close to 30 per cent with the addition of a Boeing 777 freighter to a route linking Sydney, Singapore, Ho Chi Minh, and Nagoya with the parcel carrier's US hub in Cincinnati, reports IHS Media.
'We continue seeing strong express logistics services demand between intra-Asia and the US,' Ken Lee, CEO of DHL Express Asia Pacific, said in a statement. 'With Vietnam's continued rise as a manufacturing hub for semiconductors, garments accessories and materials, as well as electronics, we see an increasing demand for our service.'
The new DHL Express service will use a dedicated freighter operated by Kalitta Air that increases the weekly payload by 27 per cent to 940 tonnes, with 102 tonnes a week offered to shippers in Vietnam.
Ongoing pandemic-related travel restrictions have kept most passenger flights on the trade lanes connecting Asia with North and South America firmly on the ground, removing the crucial scheduled belly cargo capacity around which forwarders traditionally built their networks. The cuts in belly capacity have coincided with sharp increases in e-commerce and rising demand from shippers trying to circumvent ocean congestion that is delaying imports from Asia, with forwarders turning to chartered capacity in record numbers.
DHL Express joins forwarders Kuehne + Nagel, which later this year will deploy two chartered B747-8Fs on the trans-Pacific; Alibaba's logistics unit Cainiao, which has chartered one B747-8F on the trade lane; and Flexport, which will deploy two chartered B777Fs between Chicago and Hong Kong in a multi-year charter deal with Eastern Air. Much of the chartered space will be dedicated to serving the high-volume e-commerce demand.
Edoardo Podesta, the Hong Kong-based COO for air and sea logistics at Dachser, said recently that customers were looking for capability from their forwarders that went beyond commercial capacity.
'We will of course continue to sign BSAs [block space agreements] and rely on commercial capacity, but for our strategic and densest routes we will keep and extend our network of charters,' he said. 'In the future, having your own capacity will be an important criterion in the selection of logistics service providers, and this must be considered as well.'
Additional air freight capacity is needed on the Vietnam-US routes after total trade between the two countries reached more than US$111 billion in 2021, an increase of nearly $21 billion compared with 2020, according to DHL. In 2021, Vietnam's exports to the US reached $96.29 billion, a 24.9 per cent year-over-year increase, with the US accounting for 28.6 per cent of Vietnam's exports by value.
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