DHL Invests US$210 m in infrastructure - doubles Central Asia Hub capacity in Hong Kong
- Advanced, fully-automated facility completed five years ahead of schedule
DHL, the world’s leading express and Logistics Company today announced the completion of its US$110 million Central Asia Hub (CAH) expansion. With a total investment of US$210 million, the facility is the first large-scale automated Express hub in Asia Pacific and significantly boosts DHL’s operational capability in Asia.
Situated at the Hong Kong International Airport, the Central Asia Hub has doubled in size to 35,000 sqm - about the size of 120 tennis courts - and is expected to handle 40 million shipments this year. With the expansion, the highly sophisticated and automated facility has a throughput of 75,000 pieces per hour (pph) of flyers and conveyable shipments, an increase of 114 per cent compared to the 35,000 pph throughput capacity before the expansion. With the automation, the throughput cycle time has been further reduced from 12 minutes to just 7 minutes.
“Asia Pacific continues to be a key growth driver - in the first half of 2008, we grew 13 per cent year-on-year. The expansion of the CAH is a testament to the continued growth of intra-Asia trade and the Asia-Europe trade lane. Currently, over 60 per cent of express cargo processed by the Central Asia Hub is intra-Asia Pacific shipments, a figure we expect to continue to grow alongside rising intra-regional trade,” said Dan McHugh, CEO, DHL Express Asia Pacific.
Originally slated for completion in 2013, the expansion of the CAH well ahead of schedule underscores the growth and potential DHL sees in the region. Eva Cheng, Secretary for Transport and Housing said: “The further expansion of DHL’s Central Asia Hub is a testament to the continued strategic importance and relevance of the Hong Kong International Airport within the region. It is also a vote of confidence by the world’s largest express integrator of Hong Kong’s strength as an aviation and logistics hub.”
With over 40 per cent market share and US$2.2 billion invested in the region, DHL’s investment in the CAH provides the core backbone to further enhance service excellence to extend its market-leading position in Asia Pacific.
“Strategically located within a four-hour flight time to major cities in Asia Pacific, the CAH is complemented by a well-established Asia Air Network which is served by more than 20 aircraft and over 500 commercial daily flights. The expansion of the CAH brings with it heightened speed, efficiency, accuracy and significantly bolsters DHL’s operational capacity in Asia Pacific,” said Jerry Hsu, President, Greater China Area, DHL Express.
Advanced automation & technology for a highly efficient Central Asia Hub
The increased throughput of the automated CAH is made possible because of an advanced Autosort system which can handle 35,000 conveyable shipments and 40,000 flyers per hour.
Key automated features of the facility include a bank of singulators which arrange parcels into a single queue, six-sided camera scanners which scan all sides of conveyable shipments, and a shoe sorter matrix which directs the shipments to the relevant chutes according to their destination be it Beijing, Singapore, Tokyo, Osaka, Nagoya, Shanghai, Seoul, Bangkok, Delhi etc.
CAH has also been a test-bed to pioneer new operational processes for DHL. CAH now has the ability to sort down to the individual postal codes of the DHL service centers in destination countries. This eliminates the need for the flyers to be resorted at the destination Gateway. For example, in Singapore this has translated into a 30-minute head start for DHL couriers, ensuring an even higher degree of service excellence.
In keeping with this service enhancement, from this month, DHL will increase the number of postal codes for its
DHL Express 12:00 service across Asia Pacific by 25 per cent. With the service extension, DHL can offer express door-to-door delivery to over 20,000 postal codes across Asia Pacific by noon the next business day for intra-Asia shipments.
The expansion of CAH further bolsters the state-of-the-art security system with almost 200 CCTV cameras, X-ray equipment and an access control system. A
[1]as well as 41 cities in other Asian countries, 60 gateways and over 300 service centers.TAPA Class A-certified facility, the
CAH also features a Quality Control Center (QCC) which monitors flight uplift/landing time in real time, enabling DHL to proactively notify customers in the event of flight delays or cancellations. The QCC is linked to the Asia Pacific Quality Control Center (APQCC) in Singapore
Investing ahead of the curve- North Asia Hub to complement Central Asia Hub
“Speed, accuracy and reliability are the cornerstones of the Express industry. The CAH coupled with a robust air network is a core pillar of our highly efficient operational backbone in Asia Pacific,” said McHugh. “But we invest to stay ahead of the curve. With CAH fully operational, we look forward to taking our network capability up another notch when our North Asia Hub at Pudong, International Airport, Shanghai is complete in 2010.”
Once completed in 2010, the North Asia Hub (NAH) in Pudong will complement the CAH in Hong Kong and deliver further operational efficiencies by leveraging its geographical proximity for shipments destined for the region. The automated facility will have the capacity to sort conveyable shipments to a peak capacity of up to 20,000 parcels and 20,000 documents per hour.
The establishment of the NAH will result in transit time improvements across North Asia and, in particular, benefit customers located in the Yangtze River Delta. “Currently almost 50 per cent of the shipments through the Central Asia Hub are destined for China, Japan, Korea and Taiwan. With the expected long-term projections in volume growth, a dedicated North Asia Hub will further enhance operational efficiencies and enable DHL to keep pace with growth,” said Jerry Hsu.
[1] TAPA is a non-profit organization set up by representatives from the manufacturing and high-tech industries, freight forwarders and professional consulting companies. The association aims to guarantee high security standards in the freight transportation of high-value technology products, to minimize monetary or asset losses incurred during the shipment process.
