Category Archives: Warehousing

FTH Daily, the subscription-based e-grocery initiative of FreshToHome, through partners launched a state-of-the-art warehousing facility spanning up to 75000 sq. ft. in Bengaluru. Built with a capacity to hold more than 70,000 SKUs across 100 categories including farm fresh fruits, vegetables, groceries, household essentials, dairy, among others, the warehouse will play a vital role in the operative procedures of an efficient supply chain. With an advanced grading process unit that is exclusively set up to follow the 25+ quality control protocol, the warehouse adopts a three-point grading system to segregate, grade, and approve the farm fresh fruits, vegetables, and green leafy vegetables that are directly sourced from farmers. To sustain the freshness of fruits, vegetables, green leafs, FTH Daily, through its partners, has geared all its processes for quick turnaround from the source to the customers doorstep. At 6 PM, the harvest that is at the farm is delivered before 7.30 AM next morning to the customers. In its vision to enable easy access to farm fresh fruits and vegetables to millions of families, FTH Daily has facilitated its vendors to partner with a community of over 1200 farmers. More than 150 varieties of fruits, vegetables, and greens are available on the app at mass market prices. Speaking about the new facility centre, Shan Kadavil, Co-Founder, FreshToHome, said, “FTH Daily has been a key enabler in making daily nutrition accessible to lakhs of families. Our community of FTH Daily customers has grown from 10,000 families to 1.5 lakh families who trust us for quality, affordability, and wholesome nutrition. It’s our turn to extend appreciation and thankfulness to our customers, and build infrastructure solutions that will help us reach them faster, …

According to the E-Handbook on Warehousing Standards, released recently by the Warehousing Association of India, ‘Digital Twins’ and ‘Industry 4.0’, can transform the future of warehousing in India and enhance logistics efficiency and cost-competitiveness. Digital twins in warehousing lets companies design, simulate, and test new warehouse operations and product movements virtually, before starting up new sites or making changes within existing sites. As technology drives innovation, the warehouse of today will transform into an increasingly digital environment in future, it stated. WMS enables consistent performance at a low cost. Change will be driven with real- time transaction processing, optimised storage, and selection strategies, directed task management, and integrated labour standards. Operational and strategic teams need to be able to make accurate decisions about ongoing situations. Real-time visibility provides actionable information that can help swiftly adapt plans, improve processes, minimize threats and maximize opportunities. With the advent of Industry 4.0, technology has aided visibility and real-time decisions. From RFID tags, IoT sensors and cloud- based management systems, the real-time supply chain has enabled greater agility and flexibility via machine learning and predictive data analysis. The advantages conferred by supply chain visibility may be individually small, but they can be applied to every movement, operation and transaction in a supply chain, thereby saving time and creating efficiencies that add up to significant savings.

The National Logistics Policy (NLP), launched by the Government of India in September 2022, aims to promote the seamless movement of goods, overcome transport-related challenges, encourage digitisation and significantly reduce logistics time and cost. The policy is aimed at reducing India’s logistics cost considerably and bringing its percentage of GDP in line with the developed economies. Reduced logistics costs shall help improve India’s competitiveness, both in the domestic and export markets, by improving efficiency across all sectors,” said Suprio Banerjee, Vice-President & Sector Head, ICRA Limited. He added, “The Introduction of NLP is a long-term positive for the Indian logistics industry, given its overall focus on attaining better integration of different modes of transport, which in turn shall lead to faster turnaround and higher efficiency. It is also expected to lower the cost of logistics by reducing the over-dependence on the road sector, thereby reducing congestion and ensuring better asset utilisation. Implementation challenges, however, are expected as multiple agencies, stakeholders, and physical entities are involved, which will require proper coordination for the successful implementation of the policy. The implementation will also entail heavy capital investments to be policy-compliant. The benefits of the policy should also be evaluated against its compliance costs. Nonetheless, the long-term benefits of the policy will outweigh the short-term challenges.” The salient features of the NLP include setting key targets, which include a reduction in the logistics cost in India to be comparable to global benchmarks by 2030 and be among the top 25 countries by 2030 (currently ranked at 44) in the logistics performance index rankings as also creating a data-driven decision support mechanism for an efficient logistics ecosystem. The policy will be implemented through an …

AA Holdings announced a strategic partnership with logistic development company, Avinya Industrial and Logistic Park to empower all small landlords and aggregators across the country to develop quality warehousing infrastructure. Through this partnership, the two entities aim to develop 20 million square feet of land parcels across the country in the next 3 years to contribute meaningfully towards the creation of a warehousing ecosystem at the grass root level. The joint venture will play a pivotal role in further expanding the burgeoning warehousing infrastructure development in the country which is currently limited to the top 8-10 cities only. This will enable local landlords and aggregators to acquire the necessary skill sets and knowledge to attract the right clients and make the right use of their real estate assets as India looks forward to becoming a $5 trillion economy. Commenting on the launch of his new venture, Abhijit Verma, Managing Director, AA Holdings said, “India is the fastest growing warehousing market in the world propelled by the rapid growth of e-commerce, introduction of the Goods and Services Tax and the improved in road infrastructure. These factors have unlocked immense potential to develop land parcels into prime warehousing properties and bring prosperity to the land owners by imparting the right knowledge in the best use of the asset and inculcating the necessary skill sets. Through this new venture, we aim to be a catalyst and leverage their grassroot knowledge to help them emerge as developers by imparting the right business acumen, helping them connect with clients and guide them in the best use of their assets. With Avinya, we found synergies in our vision of transforming the warehousing market in India by …

JD Logistics has opened its second warehouse in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates to enhance global logistics network, and to provide end-to-end supply chain services covering Asia, Africa and Europe for local and cross-border merchants. Twenty-minute drive from the Port of Jebel Ali, this warehouse is located in Dubai Industrial City, with an area of 12,000 square meters, providing logistics services ranging from concentrated transportation, sea transportation, air transportation, transition, customs clearance to warehousing, sorting, labeling, drop shipping and more, for both bulky and small to medium-sized products, and meeting both B2C and B2B fulfilment requirements. Adopting JD Logistics’ self-developed management system, the warehouse can digitally manage inbound and outbound inventory, thus precisely predicting the trends and allocating distribution resources accordingly to improve logistics efficiency, said release. Siyuan Yue, head of JD Logistics Dubai Warehouse said, “Powered by digital capabilities, JD’s warehouse in Dubai provides clients with integrated logistics solutions, optimizing the international transportation routes greatly.” As early as in 2020, JD Logistics began to operate in the Middle East, and its first warehouse was launched in the largest free trade zone in the region, Dubai’s Jebel Ali Free Zone (JAFZA), offering logistics services spanning GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) countries and reaching to continent Africa.

A.P. Moller – Maersk, the integrated logistics company inaugurated its new Integrated Logistics Park at Port Qasim in Pakistan. Maersk Pakistan took the bold decision to invest in an Integrated Logistics Park that would act as a warehouse, including a consolidation & fulfilment centre and cold storage, at Port Qasim. Maersk Pakistan went on from acquiring a 26-acre land parcel to carefully designing and constructing a six-shed facility spread over 560,000 sqft that will answer all the requirements of its customers through a single location. “Despite the various current challenges, Maersk has played an important role as a trusted partner for Pakistan’s traders. Maersk’s commitment to invest in a large facility such as the one inaugurated today in Port Qasim speaks volumes of the potential that is out there to be harnessed,” said an official release.

Welspun One Logistics Parks (WOLP) has committed 100 per cent of its Rs 500 crore corpus across six investments to create a portfolio of Rs 2,300 crore spanning five cities–MMR, NCR, Bengaluru, Chennai, and Lucknow– aggregating to about 6.6 million square feet of gross leasable area. Last year, the firm raised India’s first alternative investment fund (AIF) focusing on warehousing development. Of the 6.6 million sq. ft, one million sq. ft of area has been delivered and an additional two million sq. ft is expected to be delivered in the second quarter of calendar year 2023, the company said in a statement. Fifty per cent of the firm’s funds’ portfolio will be delivered, operational and rent generating in a little over two years from its first close, the statement added. Notably, about 60 per cent of the portfolio is already pre-leased to a blue-chip roster of tenants such as Delhivery, Flipkart, FM Logistics, Tata Croma, and Ecom Express, with significant scope for leasing of the balance portfolio.

DCX – a global Agri Fintech operator of platforms for Agri products and Shree Shubham Logistics Limited (SSL) have signed an agreement to bring transparent, efficient, and robust agri-commodities trading to India. SSL’s best-in-class warehousing service with over 1 million m2 of facilities across 6 states will now be available to all DCX clients as part of its secure and trusted negotiation, contracting and execution solution, said an official release. The DCX platform integrates with a variety of service providers – inspection, freight, insurance, and finance. This is now the first time that warehousing will also be available directly on DCX providing full visibility for all stakeholders on the status of the trade, and the condition of collateral. The SSL solution reduces post-harvest losses and increases food security, using scientific and efficient warehouse management systems through our own state-of-the-art Agri-Logistics Parks (ALPs) as well as in third-party warehouses. Our wide spectrum of services ranges from Storage and Preservation, Collateral Management, and testing of Agri commodities.

The National Logistics Policy (NLP) launched recently by Prime Minister Narendra Modi will help India propel itself into a top manufacturing and sourcing country globally. Acknowledging the same, Manu Raj Bhalla, President, the Warehousing Association of India (WAI) said, “The policy encompasses all aspects of the supply chain such as transportation infrastructure and technology to provide cost-effective, sustainable, and robust multimodal solutions with real-time visibility to industry stakeholders. The policy will complement the PM Gati Shakti National Masterplan, will facilitate investment in warehousing and logistics infrastructure, dovetailing into Make in India alongside the Aatmanirbhar Bharat initiative.” He added, “The vision is to develop a technologically enabled, cost-efficient, resilient, sustainable, and trusted logistics ecosystem for accelerated and inclusive growth. The policy includes a detailed action plan to achieve a reduction in logistics costs in India, to be in the top 25 countries in the Logistics Performance Index ranking by 2030, and to create a data-driven decision support mechanism for an efficient logistics network. Several initiatives under the policy, including the Unified Logistics Interface Platform (ULIP), the Ease of Logistics Services platform, an e-handbook on Warehousing, training courses on PM Gati Shakti Masterplan, and logistics on i-Got, were launched along with the NLP. All these initiatives will help facilitate the digital transformation of the Indian logistics and supply chain ecosystem, thus enabling integration with the global value chains in an efficient and cost-effective manner,” said Bhalla.” Agreeing with Bhalla, Arif A Siddiqui, Vice President WAI said, “To develop a technologically enabled, integrated, cost-efficient, resilient, sustainable, and trusted logistics ecosystem in the country for accelerated and inclusive growth. This vision will be achieved by Integrating the modes of transport, Optimization of the utilization of logistics infrastructure, Standardization of processes and service quality, Modernization of …

DHL Express has strengthened its network in the Delhi-NCR region with the expansion of Faridabad service center. Inaugurated by John Pearson, CEO, DHL Express, this is DHL Express India’s eighth service center in Delhi/NCR region and 53rd in the country. The sustained expansion is in line with the company’s commitment of EUR250 million towards infrastructure development across the country. DHL Express has been serving customers in Faridabad since 2014. The company has now expanded its Faridabad service center into a 9000-square-feet facility to meet the significant trade volume growth in the last five years. This augments DHL Express’ current service offering to customers, as it meets the growing export and import demands. John Pearson, CEO of DHL Express, commented on the expansion: “Even in these volatile times, our well-connected global network, focus on infrastructure, and dedicated people have paved the way for our growth. Our recently released DHL Trade Growth Atlas tells us that India is on track to more than double its trade volume growth rate in the next five years, and we are uniquely positioned to support this because of our unrivalled expertise. Investments like these in the country will allow us to provide best-in-class service to our customers and make us a reliable partner.” R.S Subramanian, SVP South Asia, DHL Express said: “We are committed to supporting India’s economic growth and facilitating international trade. To meet this commitment, we have invested heavily in people, processes, and infrastructure across the country in recent years. The Faridabad service center expansion is part of the growth strategy. The region has seen a 70% increase in shipment volume over the last three years, necessitating infrastructure expansion to meet rising demand. We …