Post on 05-Feb-2023
Strategy Analysis and Evaluation Project
September 5
2013 Analysis of Deutsche Post DHL
[By: Amanpreet Singh Monga – 430549193]
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Company and Industry highlight
Deutsche Post DHL is the world’s leading mail and logistics services group offering expertise
in express, air and ocean freight, overland transport, contract logistics solutions as well as
international mail services linking 120,000 destinations in more than 220 countries and
territories with a network of about 6,500 offices, a fleet of nearly 76,200 vehicles and about
420 aircrafts (DHL, 2012).
While looking at the 2008 industry figures it is worth noting that difference in terms of
revenue between the 1st and 10th globally rated company is more than 13 times. A
considerable difference when global logistic market in 2008 generated total revenue of $
3566 billion, show casing how fragmented the industry is (Data Monitor, 2009) and (World
Logistics Council).
1.0 The Elements of Strategy
1.1 Arenas
The main product of DHL group is delivery service and the company is active in below
divisions, targeting both B2B and B2C customers:
13 times
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a) Mail – Providing Mail and Parcel Services mainly in Europe and from Europe.
b) Express – Providing courier, parcel and express services by rail, road and air.
c) Global Forwarding and Freight – Providing International air and ocean freight as well
as European overland transportation services.
d) Supply Chain - Tailor-made contract logistics services and Corporate Information
Solutions.
1.1.1 Analysis of company’s product with revenue spread
Deutsche Post Mail provides 6 different products in the market, as discussed below
(Deutsche Post AG):
a) Mail communication deals with mail products, special services, franking and
philately with revenues for H1 2013 at 2804 million euros.
b) Dialogue marketing deals with advertising mail and tailored end-to-end solutions
with revenues for H1 2013 at 1121 million euros.
Source: DHL Corporate presentation dated March 2012; (Page 4).
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c) Press services deals with nationwide distribution of about 2 billion newspaper and
magazines annually with revenues for H1 2013 at 371 million euros.
d) Parcel Germany deals into inbound and outbound parcels with revenue of 1770
million euros for H1 2013.
e) Global Mail deals with cross border mail and parcels with revenue of 877 million
euros for H1 2013.
f) Pension services deals into database administration and payment processes with
revenue of 45 million euros for H1 2013.
DHL express has three products to offer namely ‘Time definite, Same Day and Day
definite’ with ‘Time definite’ international delivery being the core product. The
revenues from this product are spread geographically with revenue spread (H1 2013) as
mentioned below (Deutsche Post AG):
a) Europe contributing 2902 million euros.
b) Americas contributing 1106 million euros.
c) Asia Pacific contributing 2102 million euros.
d) Middle East and Africa contributing 466 million euros.
DHL Global forwarding and freight has two core products to offer ‘global forwarding’
and ‘freight’ with revenue contribution as mentioned below (Deutsche Post AG):
a) Global forwarding has operations in more than 150 countries and revenues for H1
2013 at 5306 million euros.
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b) Global Freight has operations in more than 50 countries with revenues for H1 2013
at 2096 million euros.
DHL Supply Chain provides solutions in warehousing, distribution, managed transport,
value-added service, business process outsourcing and supply chain & management
consulting with focus sectors being direct consumer, retail segment, technology, life
science and healthcare, automotive and energy. The revenues generated by this
division are split between two sub-division :-
a) Supply chain contributed 6407 million euros for H1 2013.
b) William Lea services which deals into marketing and office document solutions
contributed 629 million euros for H1 2013.
To explain the above product portfolio the figures have been explained in a chart below
for quick synopsis (refer Chart-1).
Gist of above discussed revenue in graphical representation
1.2 Vehicles
The primary modes or vehicles of DHL group for attaining the above needed market and
geographical segment has mainly been a balanced mix of organic (own point of sales or
Chart 1
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outlets & franchisee) and inorganic {acquisitions}. Deutsche Post AG (now known as
Deutsche Post DHL) progressively acquired DHL as global air express service provider from
1998 to 2002 and enhanced its expertise by purchasing other leading logistics companies,
e.g. 1999 acquisition of Danzas, 2004/2005 acquisition of 88 percent of shares of Indian
express company Blue Dart, end of 2005 acquisition of Exel (Deutsche Post DHL, 2013).
1.2.1 Why were these vehicles used?
The main reason what group states is that these acquisitions helped improving group
portfolio in terms of product line, regional coverage or market position (Deutsche Post DHL,
2010). The same can be identified when we look into the acquisition of Blue Dart by DHL,
where The Hindu (2004) states “the acquisition of Blue Dart has a strategic fit as DHL can
now offer one-stop solutions for express and logistics services in India.”
1.3 Differentiators
The key differentiators of DHL group are its ‘geographical coverage’ where it has unique
pan-European coverage with more than 200 offices in 25 countries and in cases where it
does not have its own freight presence, it has an alliance or co-operations in place to ensure
its services are provided to its customer. ‘Broad range of services’ where DHL provides one
stop shopping services to its customers from import and export to custom consultancy and
excise duty handling; the vast fleet of DHL group adds to the list of differentiator where it
uses alternative transport modes like intermodal, short sea, conventional rail to provide
weekend deliveries (improved transit time than others). ‘Innovation’ where the group
through the “GoGreen” program, has not only pioneered the growth of more
environmentally friendly products and services in the mail and logistics sector, it is also
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trying to transform the way they do business, with phenomenal increase (387%) in sales
figures (refer figure 1) achieved within the Group’s “GOGREEN” product range shows
growing demand for more sustainable options by consumer and the business side (Deutsche
Post AG, 2010).
The key points which we can infer from above are that it is the brand, customization and
innovation which are key differentiator for the group (Diallo, 2012).
1.4 Staging
The speed of expansion of DHL group was foresighted and fast which we can analyze from
its acquisition planning where when the World Bank in 2005 raised its forecast for East Asia
to 7.8% from 6.6%, DHL had already initiated discussions to acquire companies which would
help create synergy and market expansion for the group. ” [“We will continue to look for
acquisitions,” Price1 said on Friday in Hanoi, Vietnam. “We are in a few interesting
discussions in China. We think it is a market for the future,” he said, without elaborating]”
(Bloomberg, 2006).
1 Mr. Scott Price was CEO DHL Express APAC
Image Source: Deutsche Post AG (2010), page 50
Fig. 1
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1.5 Economic Logic
The company has positioned itself as a premium service provider to achieve its return and
profitability. They demand premium from customers as they can provide reliable service,
customise solutions (as already discussed in differentiator section) and provide superior
account management services (DHL, 2012) and (Diallo, 2012). We can also infer this
information from article by Reid (2012) where he discusses the service bifurcation amogst
top three players UPS, Fedex and DHL, where DHL is only catering to the premium segment.
1.6 Consistency and Support between the five elements
DHL has a wide product portfolio and to understand the lifecycle of the customers’
segments, they have bifurcated their B2B & B2C customers into three different groups:
strategic customer; long-term relationship customer; and normal customer. Strategic group
consists of customers with large amount of logistical needs or complex supply chain
requirement with usually top 250 customers globally, long-term customers are those
looking for regular and frequent service from DHL but with simpler logistical needs than
strategic customers and normal customers are the one who are not loyal and can choose
any other company if they want to. To support this wide variety of customer base with
customised requirements, DHL required timely acquisitions (staging and vehicle) to fulfil the
demand of its customer requirements. These acquisitions have helped DHL to expand its
Image source: http://www.iglobalexports.com/internationalblog/2012/01/05/international-shipping-services-for-ups-fedex-and-dhl/
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geographical base and technological skills (differentiator) to focus on long term relationship
building with customers, this focus will help them achieve profit maximization (economic
logic) by providing premium and customized services (Wen, 2012). Overall, they have
consistent elements of strategy.
2.0 Evaluation of Strategy
2.1 Fit between strategy and the external environment
With growing changes in environmental sustainability and increase in costs of fuel DHL is
looking at efficient usage of their transport [example – optimizing the aerodynamic drag of
the truck helps DHL save 10% - 20% of fuel efficiency and 11.3% of CO2 efficiency]
(Deutsche Post AG, 2010). The article by Deutsche Post AG on ’Towards sustainable logistics’
further discusses the change in trend of market from ‘simple model- higher cost for quick
delivery ’ to addition of ‘sustainability’ in the work flow (refer figure 2), not only for DHL
internally but (the external) clients approaching for solution also look for this, the article
further explains this with the case of Heathrow airport where in an effort to reduce
congestion and carbon emissions apart from operational benefit, DHL was contracted to
manage its consolidation centre. DHL consolidated 700 inbound deliveries a week into 300
outbound runs; the centre achieved significant2 environmental and operational benefits.
2 DHL reduced CO2 emissions by 70 %, Service levels increased to (~ 99 %) and 50% less trucks around airport (Brown, 2011). There was no
precise information available to quantify operational benefits achieved for detailed analysis.
Figure 2
Image source: Towards Sustainable Logistics by Deutsche Post AG
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With ‘3D Printing’ or ‘additive manufacturing’ and some time also known as ‘factory on
desk’ slowly gaining momentum holds a threat to manufacturing and logistics industry with
expected decrease in volumes of physical transportation and could also reduce the amount
of freights shipped between continents.
The ‘mass customisation’ of products would lead to fall in inventory levels as it is expected
that goods will be made to order which would have the effect of reducing warehousing
requirements. It has been estimated that in 2012 up to 30% of finished products already
involve some kind of 3D printing which by 2016 is expected to rise to 50% and potentially up
to 80% by 2020 (John Manners-Bell, 2012) and (Deutsche Post AG, 2010). Even though
threat by 3D manufacturing is seen not to effect in the short term but in the medium term
(coming 10-15 years)3 it is expected to have some effect, where DHL has already started
preparing itself to work on hybrid model (refer figure 3) to counter the impact of this
technology in future.
3 The medium term description is my own analysis based on different research papers and historical analysis of 3D industry that though it
is 20 years old but it will still take time to gain momentum in future. Research paper referred (Deutsche Post AG, 2010) & (John Manners-
Bell, 2012)
Figure 3
Image source: Towards Sustainable Logistics by Deutsche Post AG; Page 122
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2.2 Key resources and capabilities The key resources of DHL group are their infrastructure (which includes transport, hubs,
offices, services centres and warehouses), financial (ability to generate internal funds or
external capital), branding or reputation, human capital and innovation which work in
tandem with each other (refer chart below).
Analysis of Key resources and Capabilities of DHL group with VRIO model:
Valuable Rare Costly to imitate
Exploited by organization
Competitive implication
Firm performance
No - - No Competitive disadvantage
Below Average
Yes No - Yes Competitive Parity Average
Yes Yes No Yes Temporary competitive advantage
Above Average
Yes Yes Yes Yes Sustained
competitive advantage
Persistently above average
The company is efficiently exploiting its resources by smart and effective usage of
transportation and other resources like infrastructure, and regularly investing in technology
Tangible
Intangible
Human
Brand
Employees
Franchise
e
Warehouse Hubs
Transport
Service centre
Financial Physical
Innovation
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and innovation to come up with niche products4 which are rare but not costly to imitate for
the key competitors like UPS who have equivalent or better cash flows (refer figure 4) of
DHL and are looking for expansion in similar areas but these resources are effectively
exploited by DHL as an organization.
2.3 Competitor and Differentiator analysis
Basically, all logistics company do the same or similar job in the market. But the main
competitors of DHL are UPS and FedEx. Though UPS has more manpower which can be
advantageous for them as the industry is majorly manpower driven but this also means
increase in costs for DHL if it tries to compete on basis of manpower, instead DHL is trying to
automate its logistics to an extent possible for effective use of manpower. Looking at the
key differentiator of company, branding is the area which has helped DHL improve its
presence in certain market where they wanted higher market share, Silverstein (2007)
discusses article published by BusinessWeek that DHL had about 40 percent market share in
4 To explain it briefly, when life sciences and healthcare sector were looking at advanced technology for cold chain treatments, DHL has
built up Life sciences and healthcare(LSH) specific infrastructure that is scalable to evolving global demands (Deutsche Post DHL , 2013)
and (Stanton, 2013).
Figure 4
Source: (DHL, 2012), (UPS, 2012) and (FedEX, 2012). The figures of DHL have
been converted from Euro to USD from xe.com as of 05-09-2013 12.30 p.m
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both Europe and Asia, but had only 7 percent market share in the US before it launched the
campaign. Post campaign overall awareness of DHL by its target customers in the US was at
60 percent, a considerable improvement in presence but still this market needs more
attention by DHL which is also discussed by Wen (2012) in his paper where Yunfeng Gao,
Strategic Manager of DHL in an interview says “the quality of DHL service in Asia, West
Europe is very good. Customers like staff’s attitude. But in South America and U.S, it is not as
good as UPS or FedEx.” Being a premium player could be one of the differentiator but it is
also a weakness as Yunfeng Gao further says that the overall cost of DHL makes it
uncompetitive in certain market segments.
Conclusion
DHL might have a weakness of being expensive but its focus on serving as a premium
customer and creating a niche helps them differentiate in an industry where there is a thin
line to differentiate yourself as an organization, this was proved when they won “the great
package race” conducted in 2007 by Supply Chain & Logistics Institute of Georgia Institute of
Technology where UPS, FedEx and DHL were unknowingly competing with each other to
deliver package to five obscure worldwide locations, such as Apia, the only city on Upulu, a
Samoan island with no street address and DHL was a straight winner (Silverstein, 2007).
Further, as already discussed, the group will have to keep innovating to counter the future
threats of new disruptive industry/s (3D manufacturing), environmental impact and cost of
transportation to be socially and operationally effective and profitable.
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Reference
Bloomberg. (2006, 11 06). The Financial Express. Retrieved 08 31, 2013, from The Financial
Express: http://www.financialexpress.com/news/deutsche-post-s-dhl-eyes-acquisitions-to-
expand-in-asia/184379
Brown, M. (2011, 10 25). DHL Solutions and Innovations. Retrieved 09 03, 2013, from Urban
Tech:
http://www.urbantec.de/media/urbantec/downloads_6/pdf_8/vortraege_1/brown_martin.
Data Monitor. (2009). Global Top 10 Logistics Companies. Data Monitor.
Deutsche Post AG. (2010). Delivering Tomorrow - Towards Sustainable Logistics. Bonn:
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http://www.dpdhl.com/en/investors/the_group/divisions.html
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http://www.dpdhl.com/en/media_relations/abonnements/financial_media_newsletter/ne
w_treatments_for_the_cold_chain.html
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services-for-ups-fedex-and-dhl/
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Silverstein, B. (2007, 12 03). Delivering Overnight Brands. Retrieved 09 03, 2013, from Brand
Channel: http://www.brandchannel.com/features_effect.asp?pf_id=398
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