Mergers & Acquisitions
Sunset Transportation, a third-party logistics company, acquired 3PL Snowland Freight Services, integrating its offices in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and St. Paul, Minnesota, to the Sunset network. The new branches, which operate under the Sunset Transportation name starting in February 2018, provide expanded coverage and support to Sunset’s national freight network in the upper Midwest. Flatbed […]
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Airline Confidence Stays High
Airline management confidence remains high, despite concerns about higher fuel costs, and an expectation that profits will fall from 2017, according to the International Air Transport Association’s (IATA) latest Airline Business Confidence Index. Among the index highlights: Nearly 75 percent of airline CFOs and heads of cargo indicate an improvement in year-on-year profitability in Q4 […]
Read MoreH&M Tries on Supply Chain Improvements
The world’s second-largest fashion company, Sweden’s Hennes & Mauritz (H&M), says it will increase supply chain investments and continue cost control measures to address slow growth in 2017, and keep pace with e-commerce rivals. After a supply chain reorganization in 2016, H&M’s new focus includes investing in data analytics and intelligence to enhance retail assortment […]
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UPS Ups Cross-Border Investment
To support commercial and residential commerce in the growing North America Borderplex, UPS will develop a new package operations center there. The strategic investment serves a manufacturing region that stretches across Texas, New Mexico, and Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico. The North American Borderplex area is home to 2.5 million people and one of the world’s […]
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Taking the Measure of Global Trade
Cross-border trade of intermediate goods and early-cycle commodities point to a moderate increase in world trade through March 2018, according to the DHL Global Trade Barometer for January 2018. On its initial release, the index scored 64, which is slightly below the values calculated for previous months (see chart). That means that world trade is […]
Read MoreNoted: The Supply Chain in Brief-2018
Green Seeds Fast-fashion brand H&M became the first retailer to roll out a line of clothing made from Circulose, a new natural material derived from old jeans, T-shirts, and other cotton clothing, which can help retailers reduce their waste, climate, and deforestation footprint. The CMA CGM Group partnered with the Energy Observer, a hydrogen-powered vessel […]
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Raising the GPA
Georgia ports authority (GPA) has developed a strategic plan that allows for 10 million twenty-foot equivalent container units, one million rail lifts, and more than one million auto and machinery units per year, GPA Executive Director Griff Lynch told attendees at the 50th annual Georgia Foreign Trade Conference in early February. Lynch provided an overview […]
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Intermodal Delivers in 2017
Intermodal freight volumes posted a fourth-quarter growth rate of 5.8 percent year-over-year, according to the Intermodal Association of North America’s (IANA) fourth quarter and year-end Intermodal Market Trends & Statistics report. International volume increased by 7.7 percent; domestic containers grew by a modest 2.5 percent; while trailer loads increased by 12.2 percent. "The imbalance between […]
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You Can’t Control Mother Nature, But You Can Be Ready For It
For senior financial executives at large U.S.-based companies with operations in Texas, Florida, or Puerto Rico, the 2017 hurricane season served as a risk management wake-up call. Commercial and industrial property insurer FM Global surveyed these executives at companies with more than $1 billion in revenue and found: Nearly two-thirds (64 percent) of respondents say […]
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A Slap on the Wrist
Amazon has received two patents for a wristband system that monitors how warehouse workers move their hands. Currently, when a product order is received, the details are transmitted to the handheld computers that all Amazon warehouse staff carry. The workers must then rush to retrieve that product from one of many inventory bins on shelves, […]
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