TOC Americas 2019

Visibility and agility will become more important to supply chains than speed

Better visibility and more responsive supply chains are the only way for shippers and their forwarders to respond to problems related to slow-steaming and containership schedule unreliability.
At last week’s TOC Americas Container Supply Chain event in Cartagena, Bill Rooney, vice president of strategic development at Kuehne + Nagel, told delegates: “Visibility is the solution to slow and unreliable assets.”
He explained that only 75%-80% of containerships arrived at their destination ports …

The...

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‘Ship agents must reinvent themselves, or they won’t survive’

Ship agents will need to reinvent themselves as information providers to shipping lines, if they are to survive in a rapidly changing industry.
On the sidelines of last week’s TOC Americas Container Supply Chain event in Cartagena, Matthew Tayler chief executive of Chile-headquartered ship agency Empresas Taylor, told The Loadstar the ship agency business was in danger of extinction unless it radically overhauled itself.
“The traditional ship agency business model is dying. Ship …

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Maersk targets forwarders as digital-first revolution spreads in Latin America

Maersk Line appears to be continuing its process of vertical consolidation, admitting it is on the hunt for forwarding acquisitions in Latin America.
Lars Nielsen, Maersk Line chief executive for Latin America & the Caribbean, told delegates at last week’s TOC Americas Container Supply Chain event in Cartagena: “We haven’t so far invested in any Latin American start-ups, but we have been looking at Brazil, where there are some digital-first freight forwarders …

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Panama port community to create central data hub for cargo visibility

A new port community-type system that could transform competing container terminals in Panama into an integrated centralised information hub serving both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans is under development.
Delegates at this week’s TOC Americas Container Supply Chain event in Cartagena heard how terminals, encouraged by Advent Intermodal, were beginning to work together to develop the ‘Portal for Panama’ to increase cargo visibility.
Stephen Shaffer, president of Colon Container Terminal,...

https://theloadstar.com/panama-port-community-to-create-central-data-hub-for-cargo-visibility/

Port of Cartagena bucks the regional trend with an eye on the future

As Port of Cartagena Group celebrates its 25th anniversary this year, it has embarked on a period of diversification as it “responds to the new challenges of rapidly changing container supply chains”.
Twenty-five years ago it had a quay, originally constructed in 1934, that could handle around 200,000 teu annually, with a draught alongside of 10 metres and the largest vessel it could handle was 1,300 teu.
“We had no cranes, no …

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Going digital now the only way forward for financially strapped ocean carriers

Relentless pressure on costs has forced shipping lines to embrace the wave of digitisation sweeping the ocean container freight industry.
Frank Smet, chief commercial officer at Hamburg Süd, told delegates at the keynote session of the TOC Americas Container Supply Chain conference in Cartagena yesterday that the only way to reverse the carrier industry’s eroding margins was to eliminate the additional costs it often needlessly incurred.
And the best way of achieving …

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