Sarbananda Sonowal, the Union Minister of Ports, Shipping and Waterways, Government of India and Minister of AYUSH, Government of India, visited Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust (JNPT), one of India’s premier container handling ports. During his visit, he got a comprehensive understanding of the port’s operations, infrastructural and technological advancements, reviewed the progress made by the port through its Public-Private Partnership initiatives, and engaged with JNPT’s key stakeholders. While addressing the press conference, Sarbananda Sonowal outlined how PPP-led synergies can transform and accelerate the country’s progress. With the majority of global trade carried by sea, ports are critical gateway infrastructure which connect an entire region and its inland transportation network (i.e. road, rails, inland waterways) to the international market. Therefore, public-private partnership at JNPT, will help developing strong, well-functioning maritime transport infrastructure is a key element of economic growth for the country. This initiative will become a means to manage port operations more effectively, as well as to develop new port infrastructure, traditionally both exclusively government functions.

Boeing announced the addition of three conversion lines for 737-800BCF across North America and Europe. The company also signed a firm order with Icelease for eleven of the freighters as the launch customer for one of the new conversion lines. In 2022, the company will open one conversion line at Boeing’s London Gatwick Maintenance, Repair & Overhaul (MRO) facility, modifying 737-800 commercial aircraft into Boeing Converted Freighters and increasing its footprint in the Crawley area, and two conversion lines in 2023 at KF Aerospace MRO in Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada. “This new work for London Gatwick not only is a result of the cargo demand we’re seeing worldwide, but also because of the aviation industry’s valued position in the United Kingdom,” said Sir Martin Donnelly, president of Boeing Europe and managing director of Boeing in the UK and Ireland. “From Lossiemouth to Sheffield to Gosport to Crawley, Boeing’s footprint in the UK across defence, commercial and services is robust and growing, and today’s announcement is yet another in recent weeks that demonstrates our partnership here.”

Private inland container depots (ICDs) in Chattogram announced the new rates of five service charges with retrospective effect from 4 November. “The cost of vehicles and equipment management of the private off-docks have increased following the price hike of diesel and kerosene. Therefore, the additional charges have been imposed to cover the additional fuel costs,” said BICDA President Nurul Qayyum Khan. Bangladesh Freight Forwarder Association (BAFA) and Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) have termed the move “illogical” as it will exponentially increase import-export costs. As per the new tariffs, the transport charge for a 20-foot container (between the port and depot) has been increased to Tk1,415 from Tk1,150.

Shiprocket, India’s leading tech-enabled logistics and fulfillment platform, was processing 40,000 units per day through its fulfillment services and has now scaled to a peak of 1.8 lakh during this festive season sale. Currently, fulfillment warehouses range from 3,000 to 80,000 square feet and receive orders from sellers across different categories, but personal care remains at the top, followed by health and beauty, apparel and fashion accessories, and electronic accessories. Shiprocket Fulfillment has observed a growth rate of over 90% month-over-month in the past 12 months, with 500+ clients onboard in less than eight months, of which 50-60% are D2C brands. Moving forward, Shiprocket plans to further bolster its fulfillment services by increasing its order processing capacity to 60,000 per day with 5 million inventory storage. Also, Shiprocket will expand its total warehousing area occupied to 4.5 lakh square feet to meet the required demand.

DHL Express inaugurated a new cargo airline DHL Air Austria, headquartered at Vienna Airport. DHL Air Austria will handle European cargo flights in the future with eighteen Boeing 757 aircraft and around 176 pilots. The inauguration flight of the first registered Boeing 757 under the Austrian flag also took place in the presence of key partners from the responsible aviation authorities such as the Federal Ministry for Climate Action, Environment, Energy, Mobility, Innovation and Technology and Austro Control. The founding of DHL Air Austria is an important milestone for DHL Express in Austria, which began 41 years ago: “With this important step, we are making our air freight network in Europe more flexible and stable, while at the same time continuing to meet our customers’ high demand for cross-border express deliveries and providing them with sufficient capacity,” says Ralf Schweighöfer, CEO, DHL Express Austria.

American Airlines Cargo has further expanded its international network with the introduction of service to New Delhi, starting on Nov.12, 2021. American marks its return to the Indian capital city with a daily service from John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) to New Delhi Indira Gandhi International Airport (DEL). This expansion will be followed by daily service between Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA) and Kempegowda International Airport Bengaluru (BLR) in early 2022, linking two critical global technology markets with the U.S. and beyond. The New Delhi service will operate using a Boeing 777-300ER aircraft, the largest widebody in American’s fleet. The freight forwarder community in India is eager to support the launch of this international service that will connect many commodities, such as leather products, textiles, ready-made garments, pharmaceuticals, machinery, and technology parts with destinations around the world via JFK. “India is a really exciting market for our cargo business and we are delighted to be returning to these key destinations. There has long been a demand from our customers in the region for a direct link with New York, and we anticipate strong support for the service,” said Tim Isik, Sales Director – EMEA & APAC for American Airlines Cargo.

Evergreen is adding to its fleet and equipment capacity with an order for two 24,000 teu ships from China’s Jiangnan shipyard and 55,500 containers from three manufacturers. The new buildings will cost $140m-$160m each and delivery is expected 2024-2025. The new containers will cost Evergreen $338.5m – 27,500nfrom Dong Fang International Container (Hong Kong), 15,000 from Guangdong Fuwa Equipment and 13,000 from CXIC Group. They comprise 20ft and 40ft units and will be delivered in mid-2022. Among liner operators, Evergreen now has the most newbuilding orders, with 78 vessels under construction. Alphaliner estimates that Evergreen’s orderbook-to-fleet ratio is around 45%. In September, Evergreen ordered 24 ships from another Chinese shipyard, CSSC Huangpu Wenchong Shipbuilding, 20 15,000 teu ships from Samsung Heavy Industries in March and two 24,000 teu ships from Hudong-Zhonghua Shipbuilding in June, as well as four 24,000 teu ships from Jiangnan Shipyard that are due for completion next year. Evergreen president Eric Hsieh said: “We never saw such high freight rates and the present situation is quite positive for liner operators’ future business prospects.”

ECU Worldwide, global multi-modal logistics major launched an intensive industry study on ‘The state of API adoption within the freight forwarding market’. The study helps discern the impact of APIs on freight forwarders and understand the forwarders’ perspective on API adoption. This report is informed on a global survey of over 120 commercial freight forwarding companies. Here are some key takeaways from the report: * Technology limitations and data streamlining are major headwinds to API adoption – The logistics industry has been slow on the uptake with technology, which holds true with data capturing and building inter-stakeholder connectivity. * Lack of awareness is a significant deterrent to data standardization – The discussions on data quality go hand-in-hand with data standardization, as disparate data that do not conform to a particular set of standards will be essentially unusable. * Human-intensive operations likely the earliest workflows to be API integrated – Respondents pursuing data integrations do so by standardizing workflows within their organization in line with other industry stakeholders—both upstream and downstream. * Improved visibility and operational efficiency are low-hanging fruits of API adoption – Visibility and efficiency have been recurring themes within the survey, reflecting the positive correlation forwarders see with API integration. Tim Tudor, CEO ECU Worldwide, said, “Digitization and innovation will play a strong role in building visibility and creating integrated end-to-end solutions for cargo owners. ECU Worldwide wants to encourage the creation of a technology enabled eco-system and supply-chain focused tools to reduce the costs of logistics and make India’s exports more competitive. Stronger technology adoption in the logistics sector will also improve transparency, reliability and predictability in the supply chains across the globe.”

SSI SCHAEFER and Tee Yih Jia Food Manufacturing Pte Ltd., are set to launch Singapore’s largest automated rack-clad high bay warehouse storage facility in Q1 2022 at Tee Yih Jia’s new $450 million production facility in Senoko – the “Tee Yih Jia Food Hub”. The upcoming Tee Yih Jia facility consists of three warehouses — two cold rooms and one ambient temperature dry store — and features rack clad high bay warehouse with an automated storage and retrieval system (ASRS) which allows the automated placement and retrieval of high-volume loads from TYJ’s storage locations. Spanning more than 100,000 pallet positions of frozen storage racks, TYJ’s food factory and warehouse storage facility sits on a land area of 40,000 m². It is installed with 15 SSI EXYZ cranes which is estimated to be able to move up to 300 pallets per hour with automation technology. This cooperation comes as warehouse automation booms across the Asia-Pacific region. The APAC automated storage and retrieval systems (ASRS) market is forecast to grow at a CAGR of about 10% between 2021 and 2026. This growth is prominent in the food and beverage (F&B) industry, as companies recognize the advantages provided by ASRS systems and increase focus towards market adoption.

Trademo, a global supply chain intelligence company has secured $12.5 million seed round funding. Trademo is building a global supply chain knowledge graph to help global-trade participants discover new opportunities, remain compliant with regulations, build operationally resilient supply chains, and grow commerce. Investors include marquee Silicon Valley venture capitalists Amit Singhal (former SVP Google), Saama Capital, Neeraj Arora (former Chief Business Officer of WhatsApp), Sridhar Ramaswamy (Founder/CEO Neeva and former SVP Google) and Shalabh Singhal (founder/CEO Trademo). “Global trade and supply chains have become increasingly complex over time. It’s very difficult for a large majority of businesses to manage this complexity and avoid disruptions without using external intelligence,” explained Ash Lilani, Managing Partner, Saama Capital. “When 70% of companies reporting issues monitoring supply chains last year, Trademo’s solution comes at the right time and is using the right technology and approach to crack one of the most important problems of our times.”