Supply Chain Research

Damco, Maersk’s freight forwarding business, has launched a China-to-France rail service. While there’s a risk of cannibalizing its own ocean-freight business – rail saves 20 days on the route – it’s a necessary reaction to services launched by other freight forwarders from China to Europe. China-France rail traffic was worth $651 million in the 12 months to February 28, 2.2x the level of a year earlier. That still represented just 3% of seaborne traffic. Significant product shipments by sea where timeliness may be a strong marketing point including PCs/components ($382 million shipped t...