(unclassified paper)
Secretary of Defense Fellowship Program
2005-2006
Inside FedEx Express
By
Captain Gary Peterson
12 May 2006
Edited by
Ms. Gerry Yemen
Inside FedEx Express
Introduction
As a Secretary of Defense Corporate Fellow during 2005-2006, I was assigned to work at FedEx Express located in Memphis, Tennessee. FedEx Express provides time-critical delivery services and associated information assistance globally. It is one of several Operating Companies (OPCO) within FedEx Corporation. Other OPCOs include: FedEx Custom Critical, FedEx Ground, FedEx Freight, and FedEx Kinko’s. Each OPCO operates independently, competes collectively, and manages collaboratively. FedEx Services, FedEx Trade Networks,
…show more content…
What began as domestic delivery became global delivery with the acquisition of Flying Tigers in 1989. ByIn 1995, FedEx became the sole U.S. based all cargo carrier in China.
Time-critical package delivery expanded to include deferred delivery with the 1998 purchase of Caliper, which owned RPS, and became FedEx Ground in 2000. Viking Freight, the Less-Than-Truckload (LTL) component of that purchase, was initially less important than Caliper. But Smith and his senior executives recognized the opportunity to expand their delivery reach and in 2001 bought American Freightways to combine with Viking to make FedEx Freight.
FedEx Services was created in 2000 as a vehicle to merge Sales, Marketing, and Technology support for FedEx Express and FedEx Ground. This "manage collaboratively" effort was a well-devised method of creating efficiency and customer focus into the FedEx brand, while maintaining independent operating companies. Today, Services coordinates these functions and ecommerce activities for FedEx Freight as well.
In 2004 Kinko’s became FedEx Kinko’s. Well over a thousand retail sites offered attractive outlets to reach FedEx retail customers. FedEx also placed a bet on providing business solutions as opposed to only package delivery. Kinko’s catersed to small businesses—a key market for growth.
FedEx and the Secretary of Defense
In this report we focus on the two main competitors in the package delivery industry: Federal Express Corporation (FedEx) and United Parcel Service of America, Inc.
FedEx was roaring high and was killing all its competition by making them weaker with time.
Why would a firm turn to FedEx Supply Chain Services rather than perform its own supply chain activities?
FedEx is one of the most revered and trusted brands in the world of supply chain accommodations. The FedEx family of companies provides total shipping solutions and information accommodations to customers ecumenical. To the customer, the FedEx brand stands for a company that plenarily and plenarily, positively lives up to its promises. The rudimentary aim of the organization is to distribute a world class customer experience to their customers so that their adhesion grows and they are far less liable to jeopardize endeavoring another carrier. A world class experience transpires when caring, dedicated people secure/ascertain of they distribute quality and engender a sense of feeling of being thoroughly sure in the mind of the
FedEx is a logistical service company specialized in transportation, e-commerce and business services. The success of FedEx lies on an efficient information system. The business process is as follows:
It was established in 1973 and since has maintained its stance as one of the word top express delivery provider. Also, the organization structure of FedEx is flat. Flat organization structure allows the corporation to changes its structure because it is “multi-divisional” in nature (Hitt, Miller and Colella, 2005). FedEx orders direct authority to its subordinates in an impactful way. Each subsidiaries in FedEx operate exogenously thereby managing their network of service on their own without the influence of any other subordinates in the corporation. The population of the employees in the corporation which is 280,000 made the company to have a unique task culture (FedEx, n.d.). The task culture of the corporation is driven by the forces of demand and supply. The culture gives much priority to the customers and thereby they are known with an unprecedented customer-service organizational culture (McNeal,
Federal Express was founded in 1971. In 1973, FedEx started operations officially and its hub-spoke distribution pattern enabled it to offer cheaper and faster service than its competitors. By 1981, UPS began to enter into the overnight air market and the United States Postal Service (USPS) cut its overnight letter at half the price of FedEx’s. Despite facing such extreme competition in the industry, FedEx could still excel due to change in the business environment. The success of the firm could be attributed to several factors:
FedEx was first established in 1973 as a logistic company with the name Federal Express that be created by founder and first CEO Frederick W Smith. The Headquarters is in Memphis, Tennessee in the US. The company became well known for its fast and reliable delivery service around the world. On its first night of operation FedEx delivered 186 bundles to 25 urban locations in the US with only 389 employees and a 15 Dassault Falcon aircraft. In 1980 FedEx purchased a system for live updates on the packages. In this system, FedEx drivers share the current locations from the trucks to provide updates of the packages to the customers. This information was sent to a central computer of FedEx then the company improved the update system by introducing FedEx.com webpage. This webpage allowed the tracking data to be easily accessible. However, recently, FedEx uses Savvy bundle for packing and tracking the products across couriers. (Baldwin, 2016)
Federal Express officially began operations on April 17, 1973, with 389 team members. That night, 14 small aircraft took off from Memphis and delivered 186 packages to 25 U.S. cities from Rochester, New York, to Miami, Florida. Though the company did not show a profit until July 1975, it soon became the premier carrier of high-priority goods in the marketplace and set the standard for the express shipping industry it established FedEx has grown tremendously since its first night of operations in 1973. Now FedEx serves more than 220 countries and territories and continues to offer new products and services around the globe.
As the U.S. package delivery business segment matured, International segment became the battle ground for the two package delivery giants – FedEx and UPS. FedEx is considered to be the innovative, entrepreneurial, inventor of customer logistical management, and an operational leader. UPS, on the other hand, is considered to be big, bureaucratic, and industry follower, although UPS is shedding this negative image with newer innovations.
UPS has a first mover advantage over FedEx, beginning air delivery service in 1929. Although FedEx was the first to own and operate their own planes and introduced the innovative “hub and spoke” distribution pattern, UPS leads in specialized transportation and logistics services. In 1975, UPS promised package delivery to every address in the United States; FedEx was not able to guarantee delivery in every area. When deregulation of the domestic airline industry and trucking industry occurred, the
Fedex also known as Federal Express is an organization that offers transportation, web based business and business administrations with the assistance of a few organizations that are working together under one brand. The organization has four business portions, for example, FedEx Express, FedEx Ground, FedEx Freight, and FedEx Services (FedEx Corporation, 2012). Mean while United Postal Services (UPS) is the world 's greatest package movement association and pioneer in giving overall stock system organization game plans. It is a pioneer in collaborations and makes a motivating force for customer through organizations, cut down costs and significantly movable stock system control and detectable quality (United Parcel Service,
The purpose of this paper is to review the current market conditions for FedEx. Like many organizations, FedEx is faced with different market conditions on a regular basis. Team A has reviewed some of the market conditions and addresses which ones will or will not change. The research that Team A compiled together are conditions such as market structure, impact of new companies, pricing, technology, productivity, price elasticity, competitors, and several more. After reviewing the market conditions, Team A will show how FedEx has managed to continue growing in today's
FedEx was established on June 18, 1971, founded by Fredrick W. Smith, in Little Rock, AR. FedEx is a well known American corporation that brings courier global delivery service to its customers. Having such a wide range of portfolios, FedEx has been able to incorporate many different delivery systems for maximum customer satisfactory, with the help of e-commerce, and global delivery service it is no surprise that FedEx has consecutively been ranked amongst the most admired and trusted employers.
As the acquisitions grew and FedEx diversified its operations, FedEx Corporation was formed in January 1998, after the acquisition of Caliber system Inc. The subsidiary companies of the acquired Caliber Systems and Federal Express composed the original FDX Corp, which was later renamed to FedEx Corp. Today 's FedEx is led by FedEx Corporation, which provides strategic direction and consolidated financial reporting for the operating companies that compete collectively under the FedEx name