Nippon Express To Offer One-Stop Shipping Service To Asia

TOKYO (Nikkei)--Nippon Express Co. (9062) early next month will start shipping freight from Japan to southern China and major Southeast Asian countries, taking care of every stage from customs to transport to final destinations.

Preparations have been made to offer the service in Singapore, Thailand, Hong Kong and certain other parts of China. Marketing will be stepped up in August, with service expanding in the fall to inland Chinese cities and other Southeast Asian nations depending on customer needs.

Thailand-bound cargos will, for instance, be forwarded from warehouses in major Japanese cities by sea. After clearing customs, they will be shipped in trucks arranged by Nippon Express to six main destinations, including Bangkok and major industrial parks.

This will be much simpler than what businesses normally have to go through when shipping goods to Southeast Asia, where customs and shipping abroad are arranged separately through agents.

Furthermore, Nippon Express's new service will be charged in yen, sparing customers the inconvenience of considering foreign exchange risk in estimating costs.

(The Nikkei Business Daily July 30 edition)