“Space Po”: Maersk ‘s New Digital Attempt

Maersk shipping in Greater China and Alibaba in the end of 2016 launched the “space treasure” to enhance service quality and industry integrity

You are still in the booking price a day and a heart and cry? … … We made a special trip for you to solve problems and solve problems! ”

The end of last year, Alibaba announced the world’s largest liner company Maersk Line, breaking the traditional booking methods for small and medium enterprises in the end of the peak season in the most pressing needs, the introduction of logistics orders directly to the shipping company’s order trading platform products – “.

Recalled two years ago, Alibaba and other liner companies cooperate with great fanfare die a natural death for Maersk shipping this time together with the real purpose of Alibaba and “space treasure” products, the market has too many questions. The last working day last year, “Shipping Transactions Bulletin” with reporters about to work in Copenhagen, Maersk Line Service Ding Zejuan, senior vice president of shipping have a conversation. Speaking, her digital industry status and Maersk shipping new attempt to carry out in-depth interpretation.

“Space Po” is what treasure

In the “space treasure” product propaganda, Alibaba is written: close to the year of the explosion chamber, through the “space treasure”, customers do not have to worry about not set OTC, peace of mind production, ease of shipment. More critical is the end of the year is often a hard to find, when the booking prices are rising, through the “booking space” booking, you can lock in advance of space, while locking the price, booking price will no longer Rise, you can better control the logistics costs.

The traditional booking mode, that is, the customer through the freight forwarding companies to the dealer to the shipping company to book, the process cumbersome and price opaque, and SMEs often can not get in the peak season, not only delayed the business, more importantly, lost Valuable long-term customers.

Alibaba that “space treasure” after the launch, to provide customers with triple protection. Shipowner direct supply – shipping directly to the shipping company orders, remove the intermediate links, price transparency and security services; accommodation guarantee – guaranteed season cabin space to ensure that the cabinet to ensure that the cabinets on time; locked freight – price Affected by the market, the next single, such as market prices, has not yet ordered the price increases. It is reported that the current Maersk Line for the “space treasure” to provide cooperation routes AE1, AE3 and CHX.

Optimistic about the VS is not optimistic

In the shipping industry for more than 20 years of Mr. Lee is the evaluation of “space treasure”: “Alibaba and Maersk shipping at the end of last year’s shipping season launch of the ‘cabin treasure’, an effective solution to the market, But also worried that the risk will be rejection counters, and lock freight for SMEs to avoid the risk of freight.It can be said that this is a unique value of the product.

A liner company stakeholders to the “Shipping Exchange Gazette” Reporter admits: “‘Class’ treasure space known as guarantee, but in the case of tight space, it is difficult to guarantee 100% of accommodation; even to ensure accommodation will certainly be limited to a certain range In addition, the current liner market will not bombard every day. “The source pointed out that Alibaba has also worked with China’s liner company, the market is not satisfactory. Therefore, the ” Po Po ‘specific effect of the market yet to be verified. ”

A large freight forwarding business stakeholders said: “Unless Alibaba can bring new technology, otherwise it is a false proposition. Try to achieve through the online platform for unified function is unrealistic, because the liner market is too complicated to meet Too many conditions, different ports, different liner companies, different modes of transport, routes are different, would like to replace the general needs of individual needs, and ultimately will only fail.

For example, the above-mentioned freight forwarding enterprises, a small local businesses, goods to go by sea and air, will involve too many links – import and export Zhengxiang, import and export of Pinxiang, import and export air, bulk groceries, But also related to dutiable delivery, duty paid delivery, the seller factory delivery, dangerous goods, etc., and each link there are many elements. Therefore, “the challenges of the industry is: the demand is great, but the demand is diverse, can not extract a set of standard procedures to cover all the needs, once you can not meet some of the needs, even a small part of the demand, You will not be able to create stickiness with customers. “Of course, these people for Maersk shipping or try it.

An Interpretation of Ding

For the “space treasure” Ding Zejuan said that this is Maersk shipping and Alibaba both brewing more than six months time to launch the product. Technology is not a problem, the key is both in the pattern and objectives to find a consistent direction. So, for Maersk shipping, the “space treasure” in the end to achieve what kind of goal? What kind of model?

Current Characteristics of Liner Market

To explore the “space treasure” to understand the birth of the “soil” or the market environment is necessary. What are the characteristics of the current liner market?

Market potential. As the main mode of transportation of global trade, the market of maritime logistics is huge, and the industry potential and the growth space are huge. Ding Zejuan said that the maritime logistics industry annual market volume of at least 900 billion US dollars. Despite the current downturn in the shipping market, Maersk Line has confidence in the industry’s prospects.

Pattern through changes. This round of downturn cycle is too long, so that the shipping industry in recent years undergoing great changes, mergers and acquisitions, bankruptcy, coalition and other major changes in the competition pattern of events come and go, this unprecedented rhythm, and market concentration is further enhanced. Ding Zejuan said, for Maersk Line, will undoubtedly benefit from such market changes. As the world’s largest liner company, Maersk Line has a very solid financial structure, and has more than 100 years of valuable experience.

Reduced capital investment. In the 1990s and the first decade of the 21st century, the growth rate of trade was much higher than that of economic growth, but at present, the growth rate of trade has not been as fast as that of economic growth. In the current slowdown in global trade growth, the shipping market does not need too much new capacity, the industry’s capital investment will be reduced.

Towards electronic. With the improvement of infrastructure and the change of communication mode, it can be clearly seen that many industries are rapidly entering the electronic industry, and the shipping industry is no exception. Ding Zejuan said Maersk shipping from 2000 to develop the first generation of e-commerce, at present, the Greater China booking 99% of the electronic, document back-end documents 95% electronic, including the issue of the original bill of lading is also a large part of the realization Electronic. With the arrival of a new wave of digitalization, Maersk Line has laid a solid foundation for the development of the past decade.

Industry drawbacks and challenges

E-commerce has changed both domestic and cross-border trade and transactions. As a result, in the consolidation industry, it is expected that the shippers will be able to make greater use of digital services, increase the predictability of shipments, transparency of cargo status and reduce transaction costs. Based on such market prospects, many shipping and logistics platform in China and other markets have sprung up. However, Ding Zejuan said, look at the market, very few platforms to provide full online service, in order to achieve such as tourism, aviation, car rental industry as an online experience attractive, need to try more.

Speaking of customer experience, for the collection industry, the pain point where? DING Ze-juan said that the unpredictability of the consolidation industry and the temporary cancellation rate of booking are high, resulting in a large number of liner company waste of resources, liner companies need to overbooking in order to compensate for the temporary cancellation of the vacancy, and ultimately result in service standards. Ding Zejuan that the industry pain points because: on the one hand, the current industry pricing and booking model flawed, the price is not directly linked to the booking, booking can not ensure the use of space and empty boxes; the other hand, the current Liner companies and shippers (especially small and medium enterprises) did not establish a win-win relationship, low trust index, high transaction costs, poor customer experience.

The Experimental Nature of

Based on the above-mentioned industry pain points, Dingze Juan said that the birth of 60 years since the consolidation industry, the change is not great, some inherent challenges and industry malpractice has been there. Cargo industry to the customer experience there is great room for improvement, which can learn from other industry experience, such as tourism, aviation, car rental and other industries online experience, on the one hand to improve service quality; the other hand, reduce data processing links, with To reduce costs.

Why choose Alibaba for cooperation? Ding Zejuan said that for the online platform, the role of industry participants will become increasingly blurred. In the data, Alibaba’s many products is not only a business model innovation, is walking in the global front-end. Therefore, Maersk Line Greater China and the headquarters to communicate in the Greater China region in the hope that the attempt of digital innovation. Maersk shipping trials to be gradual, the choice of Alibaba platform, on the one hand based on its comprehensive service capabilities and technology maturity; the other is mainly the face of small and medium enterprises, Maersk shipping is not very good at this, but will not The impact of existing customers, which is a good condition for the pilot.

Ding Zejuan said, for Alibaba, the Maersk Line is also a very good partner. Maersk Line has a 15% global market share and is well-known for its brand awareness. It also has years of digital deposits and investment in digital innovative products such as trade finance in India and Singapore.

Ding Zejuan said that in the early negotiations with Alibaba, Maersk Line did not want the beginning of the new products on the market simply to market parity to attract customers, but hope to enhance customer experience and promote market integrity. Therefore, the two sides of the target and the pattern of running consistent is the focus of discussion.

The end of last year launched the “space treasure”, mainly when booking lock freight, down payment that is to ensure that accommodation and empty boxes. For Maersk Line, it is hoped that through the cooperation with third-party platform, the implementation of online pricing, booking, payment and other services pilot. The objective of the pilot is to understand customer and market acceptance, to understand the products and capabilities offered by existing Chinese third-party platforms, and to simultaneously evaluate the feasibility and potential risks of Maersk Line products fully digital, including program complexity, Resources and capabilities). Ding Zejuan said Maersk shipping in understanding the strength of third-party platform, in addition to Alibaba, other third-party platform is also within the scope of consideration. For Alibaba, its platform can also introduce other more liner companies.

The Future of Shipping Platform

It is reported that “space treasure” since the launch, the current trading volume is not large. Ding Zejuan said, “cabin treasure” is still in a small-scale pilot stage, for Maersk Line, hoping to be able to detect from the internal process can improve customer service experience.

In fact, for Maersk shipping, the only from the booking point of view, the current proportion of electronic has been quite high (see photo), obviously, select Alibaba’s “one-pass” such a third-party platform is not limited to booking Function. Alibaba “One-pass” is mainly for foreign trade services platform for SMEs, has established an ecological chain, basically all of the needs of the owner of the service can be met on the platform. Maersk shipping to enter, just assume one of the maritime transport. In other words, Maersk shipping to join, as “one-pass” platform to provide more services and quality, and Maersk Line also through the “one-pass” platform for customer needs, experience and other tests, hoping to upgrade Industry service standards, improve the industry’s credit system. The current “space treasure” involving three routes, Dingze Juan said, the next will be in accordance with market feedback and the owner of the proposed changes to the scope of pilot routes.

Obviously, Dingze Juan for the test has expectations, but not blindly optimistic. She said that not all of the cargo owners are inclined to online services, online only to provide a service possibility. Any service needs to consider the market and customer acceptance, Maersk Line is considered to reduce the booking and the deviation between the actual class, so you can better predict the customer’s needs, improve customer service quality. In the application, the evaluation of the quality of different platform service providers is a long-term plan, obviously, the industry standard set up by years of practice, can not be a few months or years to complete.

Ding Zejuan said that a good platform to provide full online services, but the shipping industry platform is still in the initial stage of development. Every time the platform cooperation, online, there are a lot of people simply think that this is just a substitute for labor, which is the lowest level of understanding of the digital, this understanding stage in the past 10 years should have passed. Ding Zejuan stressed that the next stage of the consolidation industry, digital, should be able to use large data to more accurately predict the needs of customers, and then provide accurate products and services. This is also the biggest business opportunity in the industry.