Descartes acquires Velocity Mail

Descartes has acquired Velocity Mail, an electronic transportation network that provides global air carriers with mail and parcel shipment scanning and tracking solutions.

Descartes bought the Denver-headquartered company for $25.5m.

In a statement issued today (25 June), Ken Wood, EVP of Product Management at Descartes, explained the reasoning behind the acquisition: “With more than 60% of cross-border ecommerce transactions shipped using postal providers, the growth of ecommerce has fuelled an increase in the market for Velocity Mail’s solutions.

“Global air carriers need to have access to timely and reliable information about the movement of mail and parcel shipments to operate efficiently and meet postal authority service level agreements.  Velocity Mail’s network operates with similar fundamentals to the Descartes Global Logistics Network (GLN). It helps parties connect and share information, while value-added business applications that are part of the network leverage that information to increase efficiencies and improve decision-making.”