All Asia articles – Page 113
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FeatureToyota to providers: ...let’s talk about price!
Road carriers need to speak up if they want to slow downA missed opportunity and deferred risk?But it’s still business as usualA closer look at the networkHave other OEMs changed more, or just said so?Time for a change for TPS?The door is open for providersEighthToyota’s recent struggles in Europe had ...
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FeatureA new year, with new (old) locations?
Since the late 1960s the geography of the automotive sector has been fairly fixed, with most car production in the region where the cars were sold. That strategy remains the mantra of many supply chain executives at OEMs today as well.The exception to this of course has been Japan and ...
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Logistics recession lessons
Nobody likes a downturn, but sometimes in business, as in personal life, you have to learn the hard way. Automotive Logistics Publisher Louis Yiakoumi presents his six essential lessons from the hard timesNo rest for the wicked. Despite the downturn – which led to vehicle stockpiles, shutdowns, parked or scrapped trucks, ...
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FeatureTNT targets South America
TNT is shifting gears to accelerate in the automotive aftermarket and emergency logistics sector, with particular expansion in the booming South American regionA sizeable spare parts and emergency freight businessBolstering BrazilAdvancing in ArgentinaAlthough TNT, which is best known for its €11-billion ($16.5m) revenue mail and express delivery business, sold its ...
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FeatureEastern Europe hangs in the balance
Investing for beyond the tough timesWhen the sleeping bear wakes up?A long, slow recoveryPrice, price, priceSounds like a broken recordThe day after tomorrowBeing big acts as a bufferFollowing rapid growth and considerable investment, the markets in Central and Eastern Europe were among the most promising for European logistics providers. But ...
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FeatureTrack & trace: do we need the ‘next best thing’?
The automotive industry has been talking up the potential of RFID for decades, but with budgets strapped, there appears to be no rush to bin the barcodeAuto's enduring affair with the barcodeRFID still only used in fragmentsTrack what is sensibleThe future is now... or soonAt the end of the production ...
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FeatureLogistics is holding back South Africa’s industry
With sales and exports hit hard, South Africa’s seven OEMs are scrambling to revamp their production to become more efficient, and pushing for the country’s rail and port operator to smarten up. If that doesn’t happen, carmakers may go elsewhereA lot going on at the bottom of the worldAll for ...
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FeatureChina builds a road inside itself
As the largest and still the fastest growing car market in the world, carmakers in China are hoping to develop supply chains in its vast interior and western regions, with the government investing billionsLow visibilityA crowded market starts to spill inlandGo west, says the governmentRegulation and trade disputesFiat’s Jack Cheng ...
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FeatureBack in the fast lane
Premium freight services nearly disappeared at the outset of the financial crisis. Now recovery and inventory cautious-carmakers have brought back the need for speed, but under new terms.Off a cliffSigns of recoverySame shipments, different dayCentralised purchasingLower cost optionsA cautious recoveryWhat will electric vehicles mean for air refight?To reduce inbound inventory ...
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FeaturePacking a punch
We sort through the tiresome marketing jargon to identify the real innovations in packaging for automotive, and report on the benefitsInnovation is among those words editors should always treat with scepticism (other bugbears include optimisation, continuous improvement and synergy). A purchasing manager or logistics executive should use no less caution ...
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FeatureAudi: leading the pack for logistics again
Audi has gained market share and kept a tight reign on inventory thanks to industry-leading logistics processes. Now, as Dr. Ernst-Hermann Krog tells Christopher Ludwig, it is applying its ‘new logistics concept’ further down the supply chainOrder visibility keeps Audi competitiveExtending the NLK to the supplier baseTranslating the NLK into ...
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FeatureGiving logistics in India a new name
Mahindra & Mahindra’s chief operating officer, Rajesh Jejuriker (pictured right), believes logistics and ‘demand’ chain management have improved the carmaker’s customer satisfaction ratings. Christopher Ludwig speaks to him and head of supply chain, SK Krishnan (pictured left), about M&M’s groundbreaking order-to-delivery system.Logistics ranks high in the management chainThe production and ...
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FeatureThe sleeping giant reawakens
Signs of relief have finally come to American shores, and OEMs at this year’s conference promised big changes for the supply chain from lessons learned along the way. But what will it all mean for LSPs?American on the outside, global insideWill the supply chain be electrified?Low inventory... for a moment ...
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FeatureGlobal outlook: fixing the dam for 2010
Automotive logistics companies were breathing easier at the end of 2009. Earlier, global light vehicle sales were projected to drop 14% to around 58m units. Production, which corresponds closely with the revenue for 3PLs, had been predicted below 50m.But incentives, a rebound in Asia, and gradual recovery have led forecasters ...
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Tax efficiency within the automotive supply chain
OEMs have long strived to create the most efficient supply chain possible. With the current volatility, this has become even more prevalent as businesses streamline costs to survive.Historically, the strategies to increase automotive supply chain efficiency have focused on reducing the costs of manufacturing, procurement, distribution and transport. However, recently ...
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FeatureHonda's Performance Excellence winners
American Honda has announced the winners of its 2009 Performance Excellence programme – the carmaker’s logistics operations performance recognition awards. The winners are CSX, Wallenius Wilhelmsen Logistics (WWL) and Selland Auto Transport. Logistic vendors in each category are evaluated monthly on their performance in logistics quality, speed and vehicle ...
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FeatureTime-critical recovery to continue next year?
In just over a week the annual time-critical movement of consumer goods par excellence will be getting underway from the North Pole for the budget price of a glass of egg nog, or milk and cookies left by the chimney. But time-critical movements of automotive parts have also seen a ...
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FeatureMercedes growth in shipping to China
The strong growth of Mercedes-Benz models in China has resulted in new export contracts from Europe and the US between the carmaker and finished vehicle carriers K-Line and NYK. Starting in January, K-Line and NYK will be working on a 50:50 split of movements of Mercedes’ S-, E-, C- A-, ...
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FeatureDHL opens logistics centre in the Philippines
DHL has officially opened a new logistics centre in Parañaque City in the Philippines, which will support automotive aftermarket parts distribution for international brand dealerships across the country including Toyota, Mitsubishi and Honda. At 40,000m2 it is one of the company’s largest facilities in the region and has a capacity ...
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FeatureNissan to export $40m parts from India
Nissan is planning to export automotive production parts from India worth $40m by 2012, with half of that figure met next year. The company will export production parts including engine pistons, clutch disks and starter motors from its Chennai facility via the port of Ennore to Japan, Thailand and China. ...