Cin7, a cloud-based inventory management company, has integrated its product suite with the Wal-Mart Marketplace. The marketplace enables sellers to leverage the power of the world's largest retailer, with their items appearing on Walmart.com alongside those being sold by Wal-Mart and other marketplace sellers.

India's greatest tax reform - replacing an array of provincial duties with a nationwide goods and services tax - is transforming the logistics industry in a country where moving stuff around is notoriously difficult to do, executives say.

The multiple waves of cyber attacks that infected corporate and governmental servers across the globe last week reached the freight logistics industry, too. FedEx reported that worldwide operations for its subsidiary, TNT Express, have been "significantly affected due to the infiltration of an information system virus."

When 17th century futurists imagined skylines teeming with dirigibles, they might have been onto something.

Globalization, a seemingly unstoppable trend until last year, suddenly looks less inexorable as President Donald Trump moves to put "America First," and the United Kingdom leaves the European Union. These abrupt policy shifts are forcing executives to rethink strategies based on global economic integration, particularly cost-efficiency initiatives that rely on outsourcing or offshoring business processes.