Denmark's A.P. Moller-Maersk said on Tuesday it will buy
freight-forwarder Senator International along with two Boeing aircraft,
the firm's latest move to boost its businesses beyond ocean shipping.
Maersk,
which handles one in five containers shipped worldwide, will acquire
the German logistics firm, whose largest business is within air freight,
for an enterprise value of around $644 million, it said.
During
the pandemic, many airlines have been forced to park unused passenger
jets, driving up demand for cargo space on dedicated freighters at a
time when soaring demand from lockdown-ridden consumers has put a strain
on global trade.
With two-thirds of Maersk's revenue still coming
from container shipping, the firm is aiming to expand its services to
include more air and land-based freight, hoping to deliver door-to-door
logistical solutions to clients like Walmart and Puma.
"The
COVID situation has only accelerated the fact that we need to move on
this," Maersk's chief executive of ocean and logistics, Vincent Clerc,
told Reuters.
"Obviously we are making these acquisitions to flesh
out a network that we hope to scale. So we trust that this will be
growth generating."
On top of the acquisition, expected to close
in the first half of 2022, Maersk will add two new Boeing 777 freight
aircraft as well as three leased cargo planes to its existing fleet of
15 aircraft.
"Our target is to have about a third of our capacity
provided through own tonnage, and two-thirds through belly-space on
commercial airlines," Clerc told Reuters.
While the leased planes
will be operational next year, the newly built Boeing planes are
expected to be delivered in 2024. Combined with Senator International's
six airplanes, this will roughly double Maersk's air cargo capacity.
"We
feel this is the right mix to assure a certain level of operational
control where it's necessary, but also still be able to have the
flexibility that we need by moving with commercial airlines," Clerc
said.
(Nikolaj Skydsgaard - Reuters)
