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<strong>ACT</strong>: BRIEF<br />
companies badly, leaving trucks, freight<br />
cars and container ships gathering dust for<br />
months on end. Now that the recovery is<br />
in full swing, these businesses are having<br />
trouble expanding their capacity rapidly<br />
enough.<br />
While these holdups bode well for the<br />
immediate future, the logistics industry must<br />
learn to cope more effectively with market<br />
fluctuations. These are uncertain times,<br />
and many questions remain unanswered.<br />
A recovery is taking place in some countries<br />
and sectors, but how long will it last? Does<br />
the crisis in the Eurozone presage another<br />
recession? How will sharply rising oil prices<br />
affect business models? Is globalization<br />
continuing apace, or are regional supply<br />
chains making a comeback? Will the trend<br />
toward green logistics be regulation or<br />
market-driven?<br />
The increasingly rapid pace of change<br />
makes markets more unstable, and decisionmaking<br />
in the logistics industry more<br />
diffi cult. If you base your future strategy on<br />
current forecasts, you ignore a multitude of<br />
imponderables. The two key questions facing<br />
the industry are: “How do you identify the<br />
switchpoints when things could move in one<br />
direction or the other?” and “How do you<br />
prepare for them strategically?”<br />
Roland Berger Strategy Consultants and<br />
the department of logistics management at<br />
St. Gallen University in Switzerland have<br />
produced a study that seeks to answer these<br />
questions. It examines the long-term effects<br />
of various short-term future trends and<br />
identifi es switchpoints that will affect the<br />
industry. Unlike trends, which evolve<br />
continuously, switchpoints mark changes<br />
of direction that have technological<br />
implications.<br />
+www.logistik.unisg.ch<br />
The world’s top ten logistics companies<br />
By revenue in billions euro, in 2010<br />
DHL<br />
DB Schenker<br />
Union Pacifi c<br />
The top three European<br />
countries in the logistics market<br />
In Europe by volume, in 2009<br />
44 <strong>THINK</strong> <strong>ACT</strong> SEPTEMBER 2011<br />
BNSF<br />
Kühne+Nagel<br />
Nippon Express<br />
SNCF Geodis<br />
CSX Corporation<br />
Norfolk Southern<br />
26.9 18.9 12.8 12.7 2.2 11.4 8.9 8 7.2 6.8<br />
Source: companies’ own fi gures<br />
€ 200 billion<br />
Germany<br />
€ 113.8 billion<br />
France<br />
billion<br />
Great Britain<br />
€ 98.1<br />
Source: Fraunhofer IS<br />
The recovery in container transshipments<br />
ISL world container transshipment index<br />
220 Monthly transshipments<br />
200<br />
180<br />
160<br />
140<br />
120<br />
100<br />
Source: ISL – Institute of Shipping Economics and Logistics<br />
CEVA<br />
1Q 2003<br />
3Q 2003<br />
1Q.2004<br />
3Q.2004<br />
1Q.2005<br />
3Q.2005<br />
1Q.2006<br />
3Q.2006<br />
1Q.2007<br />
3Q.2007<br />
1Q.2008<br />
3Q.2008<br />
1Q.2009<br />
3Q.2009<br />
1Q.2010<br />
3Q.2010
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