PANALPINA AND SINOTRANS SIGN PARTNERSHIP DEAL

   Panalpina, the global forwarding and logistics group headquartered in Switzerland, and Sinotrans, China’s biggest forwarding company, have signed a long-term partnership agreement.
    The strategic agreement goes "far beyond the agency agreements signed by the two parties and their subsidiaries since 1985," Panalpina said.
    The agreement aims to develop long-term cooperation in air and seafreight, land feeder services, warehousing and distribution, project and trade fair forwarding, shipping agency and charter business. Cooperation will also extend to information technology development work, including joint training and management development programmes.
    Luo Kaifu, president of China National Foreign Trade Transportation (Group) Corp. – more commonly known as Sinotrans – said that the deal will enable each side to leverage on the other’s strengths.
    Bruno Sidler, chief executive officer of Panalpina, said that the agreement serves as a spring-board from which both organizations will be able to strengthen their positions in the Chinese and international markets.
    Panalpina said that, in future, it will be able to offer "fully integrated and reliable forwarding concepts" from all the major airports and seaports to the industrial centres of China’s western hinterland.
Sinotrans has a domestic network in China comprising 52 subsidiaries and 238 joint ventures. It is also a shipping company with a 2-million-deadweight-ton fleet and operates 35 international container services.