Neopost begins installing parcel terminals for Australia Post

Neopost’s logistics and traceability subsidiary Neopost ID has started installing the first automated parcel locker terminals for Australia Post, under its $50m deal. The French company, the world’s number two supplier of mailroom solutions after Pitney Bowes, is partnering with parcel terminal manufacturer InPost on the Australia Post project.

A first machine in Melbourne should pave the way for 48 of the machines to be installed in Australia before the end of this year, and 250 in place by the end of 2013.

The parcel lockers provide an alternative location for consumers to pick-up their parcels, including ecommerce purchases, any time of day or night, seven days per week. Consumers register online to use the service, and are sent a personal code when their package arrives in a parcel terminal, with which they can open the locked containing the item.

Neopost said its client Australia Post aims to have the locker service allowing after hours collection within 10 minutes’ drive of 80% of Australia’s metropolitan population by 2014.

As well as more convenience for consumers, the locker terminals mean improvements in Australia Post’s service efficiency, cutting down on missed deliveries.

Neopost is the primary contractor on the project, with Poland’s InPost supplying the parcel lockers. Neopost said it will take receipt, install and maintain the units, benefiting from the local presence and experience of GBC Australia, the Sydney-based business mailing company Neopost acquired last year.

The Australia Post parcel locker contract will generate sales of A$11m (about EUR 9m) per year for Neopost over a number of years.

Alain Férard, chairman and chief executive officer of Neopost ID, stated: “This contract extends our collaboration with Australia Post which has started in 2009 with the implementation and management of their ‘Click and Send’ web portal for sending and monitoring parcels nationally and internationally.

“For Neopost ID, it is also the first promising contract in the secure parcel locker services business, a business which is set to grow strongly as e-commerce grows,” added the Neopost ID chairman and CEO.

As well as generating sales in Australia, Paris-based Neopost said the parcel terminal contract also strengthens its presence in the Asia-Pacific region, in which it is intending to grow directed by its regional office in Singapore.

The company is expecting EUR 50m in sales in the Asia-Pacific region in 2012, and is targeting a doubling of its sales in the region by 2015-17.