JD Logistics is planning an air freight cargo company which has been recently approved by Chinese authorities, and eyeing to expand its integrated supply chain services globally with solid logistics infrastructure, services and technologies, according to Yui Yu, CEO of Logistics.

"We purchase planes or lease them, and the cargo freight business should comply with local laws and regulations [of the countries we operate]," Yu said when asked in a Bloomberg interview about the number of air cargo planes needed for a global operation.

"By 2030, it won't be less than 100 planes," he added.

Yu believes that the COVID-incurred shortage in shipping and air freight that the world is currently facing will only have a short-term impact, and that global trade flow will return to normal as he has seen that more and more of JD partner companies are recovering and showing strong intentions on cross-border businesses.

JD.com is currently stepping up overseas investment in its warehouse network and high-tech logistics centers in main regions that have close trade ties with China.

China has the world’s largest consumer base and has great demand for products overseas, Yu noted.

"In the next 1 to 2 years, we can provide more support to Chinese sellers who want to do business abroad," he added.

In Yu’s remarks during the Global Smart Supply Chain Summit on Oct. 18 in Beijing, an annual event JD Logistics organizes to share its strategy and development with the industry home and abroad, he shared the latest development of JD Logistics’ overseas plan and highlighted the integrated supply chain solutions as the key goal for its global expansion that can bring down operating cost and improve efficiency for more partners outside China both on their local market and cross-border operations.

JD Logistics is now operating air cargo routes including from Shenzhen to Bangkok, Nanjing to Los Angeles, Shanghai to New York and Hefei to London. Besides self-operated air cargo, JD is also operating nearly a thousand cross-border transportation routes by sea, railway and trucks.

At the same time, the company has opened and operates a number of warehouses in the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Australia, Middle East and more.

Some of these warehouses are incorporated with JD’s highly automated technologies such as the AGV robots that can greatly improve workers’ product picking efficiency by 2.5 times and smart inventory management technologies that can give an edge to sellers to holistically manage and supply their products to different sales platforms and channels.