The U.S. Senate has approved new sanctions on trade with Iran's energy, port, shipping and shipbuilding sectors, designating these areas as entities of proliferation.
IFS, the global enterprise applications company, has released a module to help companies in the aerospace and defense market manage the complex timing and legal needs associated with product export compliance. The extension manages compliance with ITAR, EAR and UK Export Controls.
The 15 member lines of the Transpacific Stabilization Agreement (TSA), who until now have limited their rate and service discussions to eastbound container movements from Asia to the U.S., are seeking to expand the group's scope to include the westbound trade.
The reshoring of manufactured goods from Asia to North America is bound to take some import business away from U.S. ports. But there are other developing threats to the continued dominance of gateways like Los Angeles-Long Beach - specifically, a couple of upstarts to the north and south.
The DHL Global Connectedness Index, a comprehensive analysis of the state of globalization around the world, concludes that the world is less globally connected today than it was in 2007. The report, drawing on over one million data points from 2005 to 2011, documents how global connectedness, measured by international flows of trade, capital, information and people, grew robustly from the report's baseline year of 2005 to 2007, and then dropped sharply at the onset of the financial crisis. Despite modest gains since 2009, global connectedness has yet to recapture its pre-crisis peak.
A survey that examines manufacturer and consumer perceptions about how products are made, sold, bought and consumed reveals a focus on quality, supply chains that are more transparent than ever but a decline in overall optimism, according to Underwriters Laboratories.
The cross-border supply chain finance market space for companies employing over 500 employees and which are domiciled in the UK, France and Germany is estimated to be more than €460bn, or about $646bn, according to Demica's latest research report.
China is transforming itself from a source of low-cost manufacturing for western consumers to a potentially huge market for domestic production. Ron Tarter, senior vice president and general manager of Flextronics, discusses how his company and others are adjusting to the shift.
The shift by manufacturers from offshore locations in Asia back to the U.S., Mexico and other parts of the western hemisphere is more than anecdotal, says David Kilzer, senior vice president of supply chain solutions with Idhasoft. He outlines the factors that are causing companies to rethink their supply networks.
CaroTrans, a non-vessel operating common carrier and ocean freight consolidator, has introduced four direct, less-than-containerload services from China to Valparaiso, Chile.