Supply chain service provider Ceva Logistics announced a new branch office in Hanoi in Vietnam, noting the boom in trade and economic activity in the northern part of the country.
Its new office in Cau Giay District will provide a full range of logistics services including airfreight and ocean freight, contract logistics, warehousing and distribution, and local transportation.
The Hanoi branch is an addition to its Ho Chi Minh City office and is a joint venture with a local partner, ITL Group.
“We are excited to tap the opportunities for growth in North Vietnam,” said Nelson Chow, Ceva’s managing director for Vietnam.
He added that North Vietnam has seen rapid growth in recent years with many multinational companies setting up operations, manufacturing, and increased trading activities “which require logistics and supply chain support.” Significant investments in infrastructural connectivity in and outside of Hanoi with new highways and new airport and seaport connections have helped to position northern Vietnam as a key growth region, he continued.
“Expanding our presence in a fast emerging market like Vietnam is part of our overall growth strategy for the Asia-Pacific region. Vietnam’s location between Southeast Asia and China is an ideal gateway for us to support our customers’ logistics and transportation needs as we see increasing intra-Asia trade,” said Troy Shortell, the group’s executive vice president for East Asia.
DHL’s new rail service
Meanwhile, Germany’s freight forwarder DHL Global Forwarding has introduced a new direct scheduled block train service connecting Suzhou in China and its intermodal hub in Poland as it continues to expand in North Asia.
The dedicated weekly service from Suzhou along the trans-Siberian North Corridor to Poland, connecting North Asia to Europe, is twice as fast as ocean freight and is a sixth of the cost of airfreight, the company claimed.
This complements the existing daily single wagon service from Shanghai to Europe, also along the North Corridor, and the weekly block train service from Chengdu to Europe along China’s West Corridor rail line through Kazakhstan to Europe.
The expansion taps into Suzhou’s strategic location within Jiangsu Province, an important production area for engineering, manufacturing, high-tech products, and automotive, and the site of a growing retail sector.
The door-to-door service can pick up goods from any location in China, take it by rail through to Poland, and offer last-mile delivery by truck or rail to anywhere in Europe.
Kelvin Leung, CEO of DHL Global Forwarding for Asia-Pacific, said its North Corridor service taps the bustling production and commercial centers of Shanghai and Suzhou, and its surrounding areas. “The West Corridor rail service originates from Chengdu—one of the most important distribution centers in Western China and a hub for high tech goods, automotive and other industries.”
Making the rail service even more accessible to more businesses, DHL also introduced the rail service in a less-than-container-load (LCL) option, in addition to its existing full-container service.
Further, the company disclosed plans to plug neighboring countries into its China-Europe rail network, specifically by using ferry services between China, Japan, and Korea. Through this service, it is looking to move cargo shipments onto the China rail network and create a strong North Asian multimodal network to service the major economies of the three markets and significant volume of imports and exports.
“DHL Global Forwarding presently already runs an existing China-Japan-China Ferry-Rail service that connects China via Shanghai to the major cities in Japan and vice versa,” said Leung, CEO. “Cargo is transported using a ferry across the East China Sea from Shanghai to Hakata and Japan Rail—the country’s most extensive rail network. This enables goods from just about anywhere in China to reach any part of Japan via our multimodal rail-ferry service.”
For Korea, the company is exploring a ferry service across the Yellow Sea between China and Korea, and then connecting onto the rail network in China. “Once the service is in place, it will position China as a key conduit for North Asia to Europe, and greatly support customers across North Asia with a strong alternative option between air freight and ocean freight to move their shipments,” Leung added.
Photo: Clay Gilliland
