Category Archives: Rail/Road

As the Indian growth story has progressed, the logistics industry has played a vital role in empowering other sectors. G.V. Sanjay Reddy, Vice Chairman GVK, highlights “how the logistics sector in India, which was at $160 billion in 2017, has witnessed a tremendous growth. In 2020, its market was estimated at $215 billion”. The underlying factors driving this upward trend is the increasing demand of e-commerce in the non-metro cities of India. In recent years, e-commerce has expanded aggressively to tier-2 and tier-3 cities across the country, which has further led to the growth of the logistics sector to keep up with the rising demand. In the fourth quarter of 2020, smaller cities accounted for 46 per cent share in total e-commerce volumes, marking a steep 14 per cent rise from the period just before the Covid-19 pandemic spread. A striking reason for the increased online spending per customer in these cities is driven by the development of last-mile delivery by the logistics companies and an exponential increase in the warehousing space. This trajectory is expected to continue with annual investments being made to the tune of $500 billion, with the projected CAGR for 2019-2025 standing at 10.5 per cent. Similarly, the investments made in the warehousing segment have increased by $7.12 billion between 2018 and 2020.

Spoton Logistics, India’s premier technology-driven logistics company, successfully eliminated operational inefficiencies and increased monthly sales turnover by over 3-times for one of India’s largest auto components manufacturers. Spoton drastically reduced the Order-to-Supply turnaround time – by an astonishing 30%, improved customer collections, as well as significantly increased repeat orders resulting in record-high production and sales units. Delivering service excellence to over 5500 customers in India over the past nine years, Spoton Logistics was entrusted with the responsibility to manage post-production operations. Spoton’s team deftly redesigned workflows, packaging, and weights and measures processes in order to bring about improvements in the entire supply chain processes. Abhik Mitra, MD & CEO, Spoton Logistics, expressed, “We are honoured to work with giants in India, helping them simplify their workflows and attain positive business outcomes with the amalgamation of cutting-edge technology and our service excellence. We are certain to deliver substantial value to our customers through our integrated logistics services impacting their bottom-line results in a positive manner.”

The railways have decided to run MEMU express special trains between Kakinada Port and Visakhapatnam. Train no. 07265 Kakinada Port-Visakhapatnam MEMU special train will leave Kakinada Port at 4.25 a.m. with effect from July 19 and arrive in Visakhapatnam at 9.40 a.m. In the return direction, 07266 Visakhapatnam-Kakinada Port MEMU special will leave Visakhapatnam at 5.05 p.m. with effect from July 19 to reach Kakinada Port at 10.10hrs. These trains will have stoppages at Kakinada Town, Samalkot, Pithapuram, Gollaprolu, Annavaram, Tuni, Gullipadu, Narsipatnam Road, Regupalem, Elamanchili, Narasingapalli, Anakapalle and Marripalem. These trains will have 16 coaches of MEMU rake.

Stating that India is one of the fastest-growing economies, leading through sustainable and climate-neutral development, Gadkari said, Society should be livable, workable, and sustainable for all with an important focus on ethics, ecology, and the environment.The minister said his ministry is working to create opportunities for alternative clean and green transport fuels like electricity, bio-CNG, LNG, biodiesel, ethanol, methanol, and hydrogen fuel cell.The government is promoting the use of renewable energy to charge electric vehicles, he said, adding, we have abundant solar energy. The government has planned to shift public transport and logistics to 100 per cent clean energy sources, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Thursday said, asserting that India has made significant progress towards improving green energy access over the last decade.

The CMA CGM Group, a world leader in shipping and logistics, launched its Carrier Haulage service from Kolkata to Biratnagar via road, where the first shipment was successfully transported on July 6th 2021. With this service, the Group is able to provide a seamless, one-stop solution to its customers for moving their cargo from Kolkata to Biratnagar. Since 2017, the CMA CGM Group has been successfully operating its Rail Service to ICD Birgunj via Kolkata & Visakhapatnam. With the launch of the new Carrier Haulage Service, Biratnagar is the second key location in Nepal being covered by CMA CGM global network. CMA CGM connects Nepal with its global maritime service via its hub ports in Colombo, Singapore and Port Klang which is connected to Kolkata and Visakhapatnam via dedicated feeder services.

Vahak, India’s fastest growing marketplace for road transport businesses and individual commercial vehicle owners has raised $5 million Pre-Series A funding. The funding round was led by RTP Global with participation from Luxor Capital and Leo Capital. The funding will be used to strengthen Vahak’s team and technological capabilities, and expand its customer and network base. India has a humongous need for freight and special goods transportation for different types of cargos. However, millions of trucks remain idle at any given point of time due to operational inefficiencies caused by lack of technology. This leads to huge monetary losses for truckers and the logistics sector on a daily basis. Vahak is harnessing cutting-edge technologies to weed out such inefficiencies and help transporters optimize their vehicle utilization through online load booking.

Safexpress, India’s largest supply chain & logistics company, has launched its ultra-modern Logistics Park in Navi Mumbai. This state-of-the-art facility is strategically located near to Mumbai Goa National Highway 66. Navi Mumbai is a hub for various industries in India, and several well-known brands have their manufacturing plants located here. Being one of the largest industrial hubs of Maharashtra, Navi Mumbai is a crucial location from supply chain & logistics perspective. Keeping this in mind, Safexpress has established its state-of-the-art Logistics Park at Navi Mumbai. This Logistics Park will serve as a nodal point for supply chain & logistics in the region. This facility is based at a strategic location and has strong connectivity with all Indian states.

To achieve sustainable growth and to increase the energy efficiency of the logistics sector, Bengaluru-based tech-logistics company, LetsTransport has entered an agreement with India’s fastest growing EV startup, Etrio to add electric vehicles to its fleet. Under the signed agreement, LetsTransport will deploy Touro, a three-wheeled EV, in its last-mile operations across Delhi NCR, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Mumbai, and Pune, in a phased manner over the next 6 months. These vehicles will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by replacing regular fossil fuel three-wheelers. LetsTransport which already has EVs deployed, with this addition will further strengthen its commitment to sustainable growth and will leverage these vehicles for leading e-commerce customers, as well as in food, fruits and vegetables, and FMCG sectors.

The Logistics Division of the Ministry of Commerce and Industry has unveiled plans for the ‘Freight Smart Cities’ on Friday, July 2. It also launched a website and a handbook focusing on measures to improve the urban freight system. Freight, in simple language, means goods or cargo. These may be carried or transported by a ship, train, truck, or airplane. India is rapidly moving towards urbanization, which has led to an increase in economic growth, including e-commerce business. E-commerce requires the transportation of goods for on-time delivery of products to the consumer. Indian cities are driving the economic activity of the nation, contributing more than 63% of the national GDP. This prompted the need for a first and last-mile freight movement.

The first container block train from Finland to India is on its way carrying 32 containers loaded with paper-based products of a Swedish company. It is the first such service linking Europe and India using the western wing of a new transport corridor that seeks to cut transit time and cost of transportation. The train will pass through the Russian Federation and the Republic of Azerbaijan. The estimated travel time by rail from Vuosaari to Astara station in Azerbaijan is eight days. From Astara, the containers will be transported by road to the port of Bandar Abbas in Iran and then hauled by a ship to Jawaharlal Nehru Port, the state-owned container gateway near Mumbai. The transit time from Vuosaari to Jawaharlal Nehru Port is around 25 days, about half that it takes to go via the Suez Canal, said a spokesperson for Nurminen Logistics Services Oy.