Teleport, the logistics venture of Capital A (formerly known as AirAsia Group), said the resumption of AirAsia's flights into China also marks the return of belly cargo space in China for Teleport.
In a statement, Teleport noted that with AirAsia being the largest foreign carrier operating in China by capacity today, this means that Teleport also brings with it one of the largest cargo networks between China and the ASEAN, with network reach connecting beyond into the wider Asia Pacific region — China, Australia/New Zealand, India, Japan and Korea.
"We are excited about China's reopening as we can look forward to supporting growth in trade and cross-border e-commerce movement regionally. The full recovery of AirAsia's fleet in China will realise Teleport's extensive network advantage for the first time since the pandemic," said Pete Chareonwongsak, chief executive officer of Teleport.
He noted that the goal is to "Teleport" goods across Asean faster and more affordably than anyone else.
Chareonwongsak added that with a team of 700 in Malaysia, China, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, India and Singapore, Teleport is "equipped to become the preferred player for the fastest and most efficient air logistics solutions across the ASEAN."
ASEAN market leadership by 2023
The ASEAN is a regional bloc with member states Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. East Timor was also recently added to the bloc.
"Today, we help our customers move everything from general, large volume cargo such as machinery to small parcels for e-commerce marketplaces. China reopening is important in helping us achieve our ambition towards ASEAN leadership in terms of market share in 2023," Chareonwongsak said.
Teleport was established in 2018 by consolidating the belly capacity of all AirAsia airlines under a single comprehensive network.
Today, Teleport is an air logistics solutions provider, building its leadership in the Asean market with an extensive combined air logistics capacity network comprising full freighters and passenger belly capacity of 205 wide- and narrow-body AirAsia aircraft.
Its key customer segments served to include global freight forwarders, e-commerce marketplaces and businesses looking to easily move their cargo faster and more affordably across the ASEAN and Asia Pacific.
Celia Lao, Teleport country head for China, Hong Kong & Macau, noted that Teleport's extensive network coverage across ASEAN and APAC gives the company advantage with "reliability, speed and frequency."
"During pre-pandemic times, in 2019, Teleport moved 1.24 million tonnes of cargo out of China through AirAsia's belly space. Now with the combined freighter and belly space network capacity, we anticipate our growth in this market to double — as we are now able to serve more customers with a variety of cross-border cargo needs," Lao said.
She added that Teleport's top four cargo destinations are Malaysia, Thailand, India and Australia.
Teleport is expecting the arrival of the first of its three A321 Freighters in 2023 to strengthen its freighter capacity into its own fleet, in addition to the added capacity from third-party airlines.
It said that a dedicated freighter is also expected to be assigned for the China – Kuala Lumpur segment in 2023, extending Teleport's ability to carry additional categories of cargo – from specialised cargo, palletised cargo, as well as various dangerous cargo that is restricted on a passenger plane belly.
Cargo routes to China to resume
Teleport said a total of 18 cargo routes into China are expected to resume in March, with plans to increase to 40 routes by the third quarter this year from Malaysia, Thailand and the Philippines.
Flight frequency in these sectors is expected to normalise to pre-pandemic, with over 350 weekly flights by the fourth quarter of 2023.