By Zhou Jian
At the time of 1984 in Shanghai, there was no subway, air-conditioned bus, China Eastern Airlines or Shanghai Airlines. The airline ticket was required to get recommendation from work unit. There were few flights every day. The fixed-line telephones were rare, not to say the mobile phone. The main way of remote communication was writing letters.
In 1894, FedEx, the world's largest delivery service company and the United States' largest express company, came to Shanghai and set up an office. The office told Shanghai people and Chinese people that the delivery could be send by the plane.
Does anyone can understand? Does anyone have the need of express delivery?
At that time, the FedEx only had three employees in Shanghai. After 34 years, the headquarters of FedEx Shanghai has more than 3,000 employees and nearly 10,000 employees in China. Chen Jialiang, senior vice president of FedEx and president of FedEx China, said that the FedEx's growth in Shanghai and whole China is accompanied by the booming development of Shanghai and whole China.
The employment position: expanding 40 times in 19 years
When FedEx entered China in 1984, it chose Shanghai at the first stop. The reason why leaders of FedEx decided to choose Shanghai was as follows:
Ⅰ. Shanghai has a solid and long history of economic development. After the reform and opening-up, although Shanghai is not economic special zone, it is still one of China's most important cities.
Ⅱ、Shanghai has an efficient administrative system, and the civil servants and leaders have effective work.
Ⅲ、Shanghai owns diverse industries and various kinds of manufacturing industries. In the other words, Shanghai's business environment is very well.
IV. Shanghai has a high degree of internationalization and gathered companies from Europe, America and Asia. Many cities also have large scale, which is no less than Shanghai, but the degree of internationalization is worse than Shanghai.
Even Shanghai had the demand for aviation express delivery in 1984, FedEx could not run the company by itself. It could only find agents to promote business. The agents were responsible for deliver and fetch packages. Besides, FedEx did not need too many employees.
Until the year of 1999, FedEx established its Sino-foreign joint venture company, which took charge of all logistics, then the employees expanded to 250.
In 2007, FedEx bought stocks of DTW Logistics Group and restructure to a sole proprietorship. Nowadays, FedEx's employees in China are around 10,000, expanding 40 times in 34 years.
Investment scale: create new records for several times
“I came to Shanghai in 2004,” Chen Jialiang, senior vice president of FedEx and president of FedEx China, joined in business of FedEx’s Shanghai and China in 2004, especially in several major events. He had witnessed and made decision on these events.
"FedEx is the first to use the private plane to deliver goods. In 1996, I negotiated and communicated with various aspects on the issue that charter flight came to China. Chen Jialiang has worked as sales manager in FedEx Hong Kong and managing director of sales in central Pacific area, managing director of operation in Taiwan, vice president and general manager of business in China, vice president and general Manager of the Chinese mainland and Taiwan. Chen Jialiang has been in Shanghai for 14 years and he realized his ambition. In the 14 years, the FedEx has achieve its great growth, which set first records for several times.
In 1996, FedEx opened a regular flight between Shanghai and the United States, which not only adapted to the increase of cargo volume, but also provided convenience to the customers, then the cargo volume has further enhanced.
Chen Jialiang recalled that during the period of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Economic Leaders' Meeting in 2001, FedEx, as a sponsor of APEC, established a demonstration zone of customs clearance with the customs, which was listed as the main fruit of the meeting.
"I was in charge of the thing,” Chen Jialiang said. Wu Yi, the former vice premier of the state council, visited Shanghai demonstration zone of customs clearance and fully affirmed the achievements. The establishment of the zone, which was regarded as the first milestone in China.
In 2004, FedEx established its China headquarters in Shanghai, and Shanghai further became an important site of FedEx's global network. In 2005, FedEx opened the Shanghai-Frankfurt-US global flight, which became the first among international express companies in Shanghai.
In 2010, FedEx used the new B777 cargo aircraft to fly directly from Shanghai to the Memphis International Airport of the United States, which greatly improved the timeliness of Shanghai Express. The deadline for picking up packages in Shanghai postponed to 18 o’clock and the packages can be send to any cities at 10:30 of the next morning in the United States. This ended the history that packages were sent overnight or every other day from Shanghai to the United States.
Thesinglelargest investment ofFedEx in Shanghai was built an international express and freight center. In June 2011, FedEx signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Shanghai Airport Group. In 2012, FedEx announced that it would invest more than US$100 million to establish an international express and freight center in Shanghai. In January 2018, the center was put into use.
The center covered an area of 134,000 square meters, with a delivery-handling capacity of 36,000/hour, and operated 68 flights a week to connect the world. Through the center, packages can be quickly delivered from Shanghai to any corner of the world. In the future, FedEx will continue to invest the Chinese market.
Aiming 2020: invest in a long-term vision
In China, FedEx established operation center for Asia Pacific region in Guangzhou and then built an international express and freight center in Shanghai. Why was in this step? Chen Jialiang explained that the key point is on Shanghai’s location."It takes five or six hours to fly from Shanghai to the Southeast Asia. It is obviously faster for Guangzhou fly to Southeast Asia. But when it comes to Europe and America, Shanghai is a good place."
After FedEx located in Shanghai in 1984, it mainly delivered import goods to China. At that time, many foreign companies came to invest in Shanghai, and all kinds of goods needed to be delivered.
After 1995, FedEx became an export-oriented company, which was related to the changes of China's overall industries. China became the world factory.
And then later, import and export were balanced. After 2000, FedEx was focused on both import and export. And the layout of FedEx China has moved from the coast to the whole country. In 1999, FedEx served 144 cities of China. In 2007, it increased to 220 cities and now it turned to 400 cities.
The kinds of packages have also changed. In the 1990s, the packages were mainly clothing, toys, shoes, hats, and samples. Now they are mainly high-tech products.
"Shanghai is a big market, which is the key for our investment," Chen Jialiang said that investment and construction have been accompanied by the development of Shanghai over these years, and FedEx is very optimistic about the development potential of Shanghai.
In 2017, Shanghai's GDP was 3013.386 billion yuan, up 6.9% year-on-year; the import and export increased by 8.4% year-on-year, of which imports increased by 15.4%; Container shipping handled port container throughput was 40.23 million TEUs, up 8.3% year-on-year, for 8 consecutive years. The world's number one; Shanghai Pudong International Airport's cargo and mail throughput is 3.835 million tons, ranking the top three in the world for 10 consecutive years.
According to relevant plans, Shanghai will basically build an international shipping center with global shipping resource allocation capacity by 2020. Shanghai Airport Group's official website on January 9th pointed out that FedEx's investment in Shanghai will help Shanghai to become the world's leading international shipping center, and help East China enterprises to go global and enhance their international competitiveness.
"FedEx's investment in Shanghai will not only look at the next two or three years, we have a very long-term vision." Chen Jialiang promised that FedEx will continue to deepen China, and actively meet Chinese customers by continuously improving services and expanding the network. Demand, and common development with the Chinese market.
（Investment Promotion）
