Chinese e-commerce logistics player eyes southern expansion after northern hemisphere growth
4PX Group is pitching its Australian entry as a reverse of its traditional strength – fulfilling e-commerce logistics from China to the world.
Instead, the Shenzhen-headquartered owner of the entity also known as Shenzhen Qianhai Transrush Modern Logistics has presented a case for assisting Australia exports back to its homeland.
TransRush’s newest Australia-China Express route has finished preliminary testing, “which indicates forwarding goods from Australia to China will only take five to seven workdays at a total cost 20 per cent lower than the industry average offered by its competitors”, the company says.
It notes that red wine, which is in great demand in China, can also be shipped through TransRush.
Founded in 2004, 4PX already has a presence in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany and other Western European countries, Japan, South Korea and Singapore.
The move marks another Singapore Post-backed foreign entry into the country – SingPost has 30 per cent of 4PX – and follows a stake investment taken by Cainiao, affiliated logistics firm of Chinese global enterprise Alibaba.
“Our close cooperation with Cainiao will help to strengthen 4PX’s management bench strength and expand our global network,” 4PX founder and chairman Li (Kevin) Yue said at the time.
“With Cainiao’s assistance, 4PX will be able to deliver innovative solutions to the global eCommerce logistics ecosystem, and thereby driving the rapid advancement of China’s cross-border eCommerce industry.”
According to SingPost, 4PX has 17 overseas operations centres occupying 2 million cubic metres of storage space.
“Cainiao’s recent investment in 4PX is expected to strengthen Alibaba’s eCommerce global development strategy,” it says.
“4PX is the only Chinese company in the cross-border eCommerce logistics solutions space to have attracted investment from Alibaba.”
At present, 4PX handles 60 million transactions originating from China market alone, while its overseas centres are managing an average of 100,000 daily transactions.
“The integration of Cainiao’s network data resource with TransRush’s system will accelerate the development of an intelligent logistics system,” TransRush quotes director Fatin Huang as saying.
“All corporations involved in cross-border e-commerce will benefit in future.”
The company adds that increasing capital inflow to the logistics industry will bring about even more heated competition in cross-border e-commerce “and TransRush’s launch in Australia looks set to shake up the industry”.
Billions of dollars of investment has been thrown at the Chinese transport and logistics sector recently, with another Alibaba-backed firm, Best Logistics, reported in January as raising US$700 million, while Qube-allied Asciano investor Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) made a US$1.25 billion in logistics property development in December on top of a US$500 million investment in November.