Nippon Express upgrades its comprehensive logistics services in Vietnam

-- Becomes first Japanese company in Vietnam to operate its own CFS --

Nippon Express (Vietnam) Co., Ltd. ("NEV"; Masakazu Shirai, President), a local subsidiary of Nippon Express Co., Ltd. (Masanori Kawai, President), has obtained the first-ever CFS license issued by Vietnam to a Japanese logistics company, and on December 14 will open the Nippon Express Vietnam Hanoi Branch Quang Minh Warehouse, a new location with CFS functions situated in Hanoi's Quang Minh Industrial Park.

About 370 Japanese companies presently operate in northern Vietnam, in particular in industrial parks near Hanoi, and many of these companies are export processors exporting finished goods and production parts from Hai Phong Port to Europe, the US and other parts of Asia. Because the CFS warehouses handling ocean cargo were concentrated in the port area, exporters previously had to arrange their own cargo transport from Hanoi and environs to Hai Phong Port. With the Quang Minh Warehouse now licensed as a CFS, customers can enjoy greater convenience and safety because the CFS warehouse operations heretofore carried out at Hai Phong Port can now be completed at this warehouse in Hanoi.

NEV was established in July 2000, and has since centered its business efforts on air/ocean cargo forwarding and overseas removals. As the recently acquired CFS license will allow the company to consolidate CFS warehouse, bonded warehouse, and general warehouse functions into one location, ocean cargo NVOCC service and export consolidated truck service within Asia can now be offered, and a system will be put in place capable of providing high-quality services to meet the needs of a broad range of customers, from export processors to companies focused on sales within Vietnam, entirely in-house.

The Quang Minh Industrial Park is favorably located for Japanese companies operating in or around Hanoi, being about 30 minutes by car from central Hanoi and about 15 minutes from Noi Bai International Airport. In addition to offering easy access to the border with China, the site will be utilized as a CFS warehouse for regular consolidated trucking services between the China-Vietnam and Thailand-Vietnam borders, serving as the relay point in northern Vietnam for Nippon Express'SS7000 trucking route network connecting Shanghai and Singapore. The warehouse will be outfitted with REWARDS, Nippon Express' warehouse management information system, and will be capable of providing services such as Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) and Just-in-Time (JIT) delivery that meet customers' high-level SCM needs.