DHL Group is shifting its strategy to focus more on express air shipments, adopting an integrator business model to enhance its market position. The company plans to target industries like life sciences and healthcare, where fast and reliable delivery is crucial. This move is expected to strengthen DHL’s control over cargo operations and allow it to leverage its extensive express network more effectively.
Air shipments
The company anticipates that express air shipments will continue to grow at a faster rate than general air cargo. This is attributed to the higher flexibility and reliability of express services, which are well-suited for handling both business-to-business (B2B) and premium business-to-consumer (B2C) deliveries. DHL’s focus on improving its express network is aimed at capitalizing on these advantages and sustaining long-term growth in the sector.
“You see historically that Express, the integrator business model has taken share from the carrier forwarder model, and we would, as others, expect that to continue. That’s what we see as an opportunity and that we will continue to work on, especially with our cross-divisional initiative on Life Sciences & Healthcare, which will get us more cargo control and will enable us to leverage our fantastic Express network to a greater extent also in that sector. Express carriers have outpaced overall air cargo growth due to the higher flexibility, reliability and speed of their door-to-door services to handle B2B as well as premium B2C shipments,” Group chief executive Tobias Meyer.
“Airfreight volumes have been more volatile across cyclical swings and therefore seen a stronger recovery in recent quarters. Nevertheless, external forecasts confirm expectations that air express will in the longer run continue to grow stronger than air cargo.”