CNS: rumours of its demise may be premature

IATA's Brendan Sullivan takes centre stage after CNS president Laura Pullins resigned Photo: IATA

Speculation that the CNS Partnership event may have run its course seems premature.

Attended by some 700 people this year, the event is primarily based around forwarder and airline negotiations, both for the rest of the year and 2025.

While one forwarder drily noted that if both parties are only talking at CNS, they have a problem, others explained it was an easy way to see multiple companies, although the scheduling of a meeting every half hour for most people appeared gruelling.

The rumours of the demise of CNS, IATA’s US offshoot, came about in part because of last month’s resignation by its president, Laura Pullins, who apparently had not been enjoying the job. CNS also runs the CASS USA settlements system, which is starting to lose its lustre.

New payments systems are entering the market, whether through booking platforms, PayCargo and its rivals, or industry bodies and CASS no longer has a monopolistic position in the market.

This of course could affect CASS – and IATA – globally.

While CASS does not bring in revenue for IATA, the selling of its data, does. Big revenues. So if more payments systems come into the market, does the value of CASS, and its data, remain?

Yes, argued head of IATA Cargo Brendan Sullivan (or “Mr Listerine”, as some publications would have it).

“We recognise that there are a number of competitors out there. Some of them are in adjacent markets, where CASS is not operating … but others are competing with us directly. I think that’s a good thing. We plan to continue to offer CASS and to continue to evolve the services in relation to what people are asking for. So we just launched CASS 2.0, which redid the whole CASS Link portal and lends itself to all manner of other improvements, all kinds of different services.”

Noting it was “an extremely robust system that has near-zero defaults… and is incredibly well maintained”, Mr Sullivan believed the competition had also helped IATA “step up our game”.

IATA is building-in credit card options, trying to resolve issues and reconciliation quickly through technology. (Others in the industry, though, point to chronic issues with CASS 2.0, plus IATA’s cost-cutting exercise that saw its veteran CASS experts replaced by a less experienced team in Madrid).

In terms of the quality of CASS data, Mr Sullivan said IATA also used “direct data”, which supplements the CASS data, adding: “It’s a win-win, that airlines get to share this larger data set that’s much more complementary than just what we get through CASS.”

So, CASS is fighting back, apparently. But criticism of IATA remains in play: chat around the CNS event also noted IATA Cargo’s lack of presence in the market since former head Glyn Hughes left to join Tiaca. One long-standing sponsor of IATA’s WCS event, noted how no one had asked him what he thought, whether his money had been well spent and that IATA’s communications and accessibility was poor, a change since Willie Walsh had taken over the association.

But the ever-diplomatic Brandon Fried, of the Airforwarders Association, said he “viewed IATA as the mothership of air cargo”.

“I think they have their place in the ecosystem. Certainly they have their internal challenges.

“What the future of CASS is, I can’t tell you, because I simply don’t know, but I would say that they know there’s competition out there now and they know they have to respond to it; how they do it is up to them.”

He added: “But I think that the notion that CNS won’t exist any more is probably not accurate.”

Will forwarders switch settlements systems? Mr Fried answered: “All I can say is that my members are always looking for new opportunities.”

Back to the surprisingly well-attended CNS event (in particular in relation to the number of women present): the focus on meetings meant that the conference itself was rather unloved, something of an after-thought. Again there was a golf day, (a sport which, as noted by Cathay Cargo’s Jennifer Briggs, is played by just 8% of people in the US, three-quarters of whom are male, and more than 70% over 34 years old).

But the session on diversity and women in air cargo – during which she pointed this out – was one of the best. Sponsored by Cathay Cargo and ably moderated by Chris Bowden of Cathay’s equality team and head of its global partnerships, it looked at ‘blinding’ CVs, how to open up the operational side of air cargo to women and the role of men in promoting diversity.

In fact, it was a far cry from last year’s frustrating panel on the same topic.

So CNS appears to have had a reprieve – another event seems assured, at which airlines will again no doubt bemoan the lack of backhaul from the US and the tight margins forwarders offer.

And perhaps, lead to yet another colourful debate on whether airlines need forwarders at all …