News / Maersk's first airfreight shipment takes off from Thailand

Maersk has completed its first airfreight charter after dumping the Damco brand last month.

It was the first of 11 charter flights for a tyre manufacturer in Thailand, with the cargo arriving in Nagoya, Japan, on Sunday.

Sasiphen Klaimanee, area head of airfreight at Maersk Thailand, Malaysia & Singapore (TMS), said while the client was previously a regular air cargo customer for Damco, the current airfreight capacity crunch required finding a new charter flight solution – in this case, one of the new breed pax-freighters.

She told The Loadstar: “We have been dealing with many different airlines, and AirAsiaX (XJ) offered the best fit, both on charter cost and on load ability.”

Maersk said this was the first airfreight shipment after Damco’s air services were combined with Maersk’s logistics products, as of early October, in order to complement its “end-to-end offering for clients around the world.”

Maersk TMS managing director Rupesh Jain said the shipment demonstrated the company’s ambition to become the “integrator of container logistics.”

He added: “We have provided our ocean customer with extended landside services and, by offering this air solution, we have truly completed the transport mode circle.

“By combining the speed of air with the cost savings of other modes, customers will be able to reduce inventory and improve their service offerings by fast response time at an affordable price.”

Maersk has been busy expanding its rail freight services, too. With air and sea capacity plummeting this year, high demand saw the company turning its trial ocean-rail product between Europe and the Far East and Russia into a permanent weekly service.

The move to axe Damco was announced last month, the Danish transport and logistics group aiming to “boost its value proposition”.

However, Maersk has been criticised for “never-ending changes in strategic direction”, having previously switched logistics services from Maersk Logistics to Damco and now back to Maersk.

Yesterday, the company confirmed there would be around 2,000 redundancies as a consequence of axing the Damco and Safmarine brands, as well as the rationalisation of back office and sales roles at subsidiary carrier Hamburg Süd.