We are seeing a lot of companies in the project freight forwarding changing their strategy for the future.
It has been known for some time now that the freight forwarders as we know them will not be around in the future and that the landscape is taking a drastic and quick change into more collaborating and sharing economy. One of the pioneering companies in this field is XELLZ who came up with a complete overhaul in the approach of project logistics and basically taking a step away from freight forwarding all together. Together with sophisticated IT tools this is possible however companies often underestimating the role of the IT.
IT is a great means in the change of any industry and this is no different in that of the project logistics. XELLZ however has brought project logistics to a whole new level whereby corporations will save 25% of the project logistics costs. This is important for companies to be competitive in a world where competition is tough.
Other companies are also taking steps or at least realize that if they do not take on change, change will take them on and this means that we will see a great number of companies that will disappear from the industry soon. In the latest Breakbulk magazine we can read that Lars Greiner (Commercial Manager) of F.H. Bertling Logistics GmbH is telling us that Bertling has and is making changes already and moving toward being more the carrier by owning assets in different places. Whether or not this is the solution is to be seen in time. The difference is that some go for IT and process solutions in order to control large projects from A to Z and others will move towards being the carrier in the game and responsible for only part of a project.
We see that more and more EPC companies and Manufacturing companies are moving towards taking the full responsibility for the project logistics. Without a team of logistics people this would be impossible to do and will bring with it a lot of costs, however, as we mentioned in the case of XELLZ, some companies have come with very ingenious solutions whereby the EPC or Manufacturing company will have full transparency in the process, is fully in control, save money and is in fact in a much better position as part of the whole project.
A number of EPC and Manufacturing companies have made a move towards changes and the success rate has not always been what was expected in the first place. At the upcoming Breakbulk Conference in Abu Dhabi on February 6 & 7 we will learn of the changes that some of the industry players like Bertling, Panalpina but also from Mr. Thomas Skellingsted, Vice President Heavy Lift & Project Operations of ABB and how they have made the changes in their new set-up in Dubai where heavy lift and project cargo is being organized from a global coordination or competence center which is outsourced to an external company.
Register for Breakbulk Middle East 2018 at breakbulk.com/bbme2018
