The week that was: 26 August, 2011
Canada Post restructuring drives digital agenda, Brazilian lawmakers back postal reforms, UPS boosts green credentials and Swiss Post reveals future of long-distance publishing…
Summing up the top stories of the week on Post&Parcel, with modernisation top of the agenda for a number of postal operators, while Swiss Post brought a touch of modernisation to the newspaper industry.
Canada Post develops split personality
Canada Post revealed that it has restructured its activities into two newly-created business units – a Physical Delivery Network and a Digital Delivery Network.
Leading the two new units, under continuing president/CEO Deepak Chopra, are Jacques Côté as group president for the physical delivery network, and Kerry Munro as group president of the digital delivery network. Prior to his appointment in July, Côté was
Canada Post’s chief operating officer and now takes on the task of rebuilding consumer confidence in traditional mail services after the summer’s costly strike action. Kerry Munro is new to Canada Post, appointed this month to drive forward Canada Post’s digital ambitions – and having built Yahoo! Canada into the largest digital media company in Canada, he certainly has the credentials.
Brazil’s lawmakers back postal reforms
The Chamber of Deputies, the lower house in Brazil’s National Congress, debated a law to modernise Correios/ECT, Brazil’s Post Office, and ultimately passed the measure for consideration by Brazil’s Senate.
The legislation will give ECT a new corporate-style management structure, and for the first time will allow the state-owned company to make acquisitions and buy either stakes in other companies or entire companies outright. It will also allow ECT to operate outside Brazil’s borders.
ECT executives believe the move will allow the Post to operate like the big integrators, making use of its huge size to gain a bigger presence on the world stage like Deutsche Post. Brazil’s unions, who staged a protest in the Congress this week, fear stepping closer towards privatisation.
UPS goes green in California, celebrates on Wall Street
Celebrating ahead of its 105th birthday on Sunday (August 28), UPS rang the bell at the New York Stock Exchange.
The company also used the occasion to highlight its sustainability efforts, displaying a hybrid-electric vehicle on Wall Street in the week that it announced plans to deploy 100 all-electric delivery vans in California, as the next stage of its “rolling laboratory”.
The class-6 vehicles will be provided by Electric Vehicles International, a Californian manufacturer who says they will have a 90-mile range and a 65mph top speed, requiring six to 12 hours to fully recharge.
And finally…
Swiss Post revealed its pioneering hybrid mail service this week, which has allowed daily newspapers to be delivered as far away as Malta and Cyprus on the very day of publication – without a single aircraft required.
