Turkish Airlines’ Turkish Cargo has signed a partnership deal with Chinese cargo giant, ZTO, and Hong Kong based, PAL Air. This partnership is a huge strategic step for Turkey prior to the opening of the Istanbul New Airport and is hailed as a game changer for the global express transport business.
“The Istanbul New Airport opens on October 29th this year and it will function as Turkish Airlines’ main operating hub. This mega hub, will eventually provide Turkish Cargo with up to 4 million tons of cargo handling capacity, becoming one of the top air cargo brands in the world. The joint venture is expected to generate over 2 billion USD of revenue annually by its fifth year,” said Mr. M. İlker Aycı, Chairman of the Board and the Executive Committee, Turkish Airlines.
The services of the new global express joint venture company, which will be based in Hong Kong, will include all door to door logistics activities; trucking, collection & distribution, freight transportation, cross docking and final mile delivery. It will also include warehouse management and order and supply chain management when necessary.
ZTO is the world’s largest parcel distributor, delivering 28 million parcels a day. Recently, global giant Alibaba Group announced it was buying 10% of ZTO Express with an investment of US$1.38 billion.
