The United States Postal Service (USPS) is facing an existential crisis. With a $9B loss in 2025, and with traditional mail volumes in a state of irreversible decline, the post finds itself at a critical juncture.

In a March 2026 testimony before Congress, Postmaster General David Steiner laid out the gravity of the situation, warning that the USPS could run out of cash within 12 months.

His requests included (1) raising the agency’s debt ceiling, (2) increasing its pricing authority and (3) legislative “flexibility” regarding the Universal Service Obligation (USO) — the legal mandate that dictates that USPS provides accessible letter mail service to all residents, which is specifically codified to include a requirement for 6 days a week mail delivery.

The USO predicament is not unique to the United States.

Postal services around the world have been grappling with the same letter mail apocalypse for over a decade now. As email, social media, and electronic billing have replaced the physical letter, these legacy institutions have been forced to adapt or face insolvency.

To understand the potential paths forward for the USPS, let’s take a constructive look into what other nations have already done. Their experiences might offer a valuable blueprint and learning for what might be possible.

The Global Response to a Universal Challenge

Faced with similar pressures, postal operators worldwide pursued a wide range of strategies to align their costs with the new reality of declining letter mail volumes, moving beyond simple price increases to fundamentally restructure their operations and legal mandates.

Denmark (PostNord): Ceased letter delivery entirely (2025); mandatory digital mail (e-Boks);

Canada (Canada Post): Ending door-to-door delivery in favor of community mailboxes; reducing delivery frequency to 2-3 days/week for non-urgent mail.

United Kingdom (Royal Mail): Privatized in 2013; moved to 5-day/week delivery for 2nd Class mail; lobbying for further USO relaxation.

Norway (Posten Norge): Implemented alternate-day delivery; slowed service standards; workforce reduction of 33% since 2015.

Sweden (PostNord): Proactively implemented alternate-day delivery in many areas; seeking further regulatory relief.

Australia (Australia Post): Reduced regular letter delivery to every-other-day; extended delivery timeframes for all letters.

New Zealand (New Zealand Post): Reduced delivery to 2 days/week (urban) and 3 days/week (rural); reducing the number of required postal outlets.

Germany (Deutsche Post): Legislated slower delivery standards (95% of letters within 3 days, up from 2); scrapped next-day requirement.

Japan (Japan Post): Ended Saturday delivery; extended delivery times by one day; launched a “digital address” system.

Switzerland (Swiss Post): Integrating a digital letter into the statutory USO; harmonizing punctuality standards for letters and parcels.

France (La Poste): Maintains 6-day delivery but receives direct government compensation for the net cost of the USO.

Three Models of Postal Transformation

The various national strategies appear to fall into 1 of 3 approaches:

1. The Radical Pivot: The Danish Model

Denmark represents the most dramatic response to the letter mail apocalypse. After a 90% collapse in letter volume since 2000, PostNord, with the backing of the Danish government, made the decision to cease letter delivery entirely by the end of 2025.

The country has transitioned to a mandatory digital mail system via e-Boks, through which citizens are legally required to receive official communications from the government.

This decisive move effectively eliminated the economic justification for a national letter delivery network, allowing PostNord to pivot its entire infrastructure and focus exclusively on the growing and competitive parcel market.

2. Pragmatic Reductions: The Alternate-Day Approach

A more common strategy, adopted by countries like Norway, Sweden, Australia, and New Zealand, has been to reduce the frequency of delivery rather than eliminate it.

Norway moved to alternate-day delivery in 2016, a move that, combined with other reforms, cut operating costs in its mail division by approximately 35%.

Similarly, Australia Post is in the process of rolling out every-other-day delivery for regular letters nationwide, a reform projected to deliver a significant improvement to its financial position after a $200.3 million loss in FY2023.

This model preserves the concept of a universally accessible mail service but adjusts the service level to match modern demand and fiscal constraints.

3. Structural and Legislative Adjustments

Other nations have focused on changing the underlying rules of the game.

Canada Post is systematically ending door-to-door delivery for its remaining customers, transitioning them to more cost-effective community mailboxes—a move expected to generate nearly $400 million in annual savings.

In Germany, the government modernized its Postal Act by scrapping the next-day delivery requirement and formally legislating a slower, 3-day standard for the vast majority of letters, giving Deutsche Post crucial operational flexibility and cost savings.

The United Kingdom took the path of privatization with Royal Mail, which has since moved to five-day delivery for second-class mail and continues to lobby its regulator, Ofcom, for further relaxation of its USO.

In France, the government has taken a different approach, maintaining a six-day delivery mandate but providing La Poste with direct state compensation for the net cost of fulfilling this public service obligation.

The Unspoken Choice Before the United States

The debate sparked by Postmaster General Steiner’s testimony is not merely about accounting or borrowing limits; it is about defining the purpose and structure of a national postal service in the 21st century.

The path forward for the USPS can be seen through the lens of the global models:

Maintain the Status Quo: This involves continuing to fund the current 6-day delivery model through increased borrowing and higher stamp prices. As international examples suggest, this approach may provide temporary relief but fails to address the fundamental structural decline and is likely to lead to recurring financial crises.

Incremental Modernization: This path would involve Congress amending the Postal Service Reform Act of 2022 to allow for a reduction in delivery frequency, similar to the models in Australia or Norway. This would represent a significant cost-saving measure while preserving a nationwide mail delivery network.

Radical Reinvention: A more long-term and disruptive path might involve a deliberate, multi-year strategy to transition away from physical letters as the primary means of communication, embracing digital identity services, and reorienting the USPS infrastructure around the competitive parcel market, mirroring the strategic direction of Denmark and others. Whether this is right for the US or not is another discussion, but we can at least study and learn from other countries.

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You know them as the Big 3: DHL, UPS, and FedEx. The kings of ecommerce logistics. Each nearing $100B in annual revenues, but all facing similar challenges. One of the clearest visions all three have given to the market is massive venture and investment into health care logistics.

Healthcare logistics, which includes pharmaceutical has long been a high margin specialized niche, but the Covid-19 pandemic thrust it into the spotlight.

The strategy makes perfect sense for many reasons:

1. Boomers, the largest generation, are nearing retirement

2. Advances in science and medicine are expected to prolong lifespans, with big bets on nanotech, cybernetics, and genetics poised to deliver potential breakthroughs

3. Boomers’ are the wealthiest generation with big expectations for healthcare spending

Good healthcare logistics is highly global in nature, requires control of infrastructure from airplanes to storage to distribution, mastery of compliance, and is increasingly taking a B2C shipment-to-consignee approach. The Big 3 were built for this kind of thing.

Build vs Buy

The most interesting difference is strategy is UPS and DHL’s “buy” vs FedEx’s “build” strategy. UPS has made 3 large acquisitions in 2025 alone while FedEx has not announced any acquisitions, but has publicly shared revenue milestones including $400 million in new annualized revenue in 2025, and $500 million in wins in 2024.

FedEx Highlights

• First global integrator to achieve CEIV Pharma certification for ground handling across air hubs and ramps

• 130+ cold chain facilities worldwide

UPS Healthcare Acquisitions

1. Andlauer Healthcare Group (AHG)

• Amount: $1.6 billion USD (CAD $2.2B)

• Announced: April 24, 2025

• Completed: November 3, 2025

• Target: Leading North American supply chain management company specializing in cold chain transportation for healthcare

• Significance: Expands UPS Healthcare’s cold chain and pharma capabilities across North America

2. Frigo-Trans & BPL

• Amount: Not disclosed

• Completed: January 8, 2025

• Target: German/European healthcare cold-chain logistics providers

• Significance: Expands global pharma cold-chain storage and transport network in Europe

3. Bomi Group

• Amount: Not disclosed

• Date: Recent (not specified)

• Target: Multi-national healthcare logistics firm serving Europe and Latin America

4. Marken

• Amount: Not disclosed

• Announced: November 7, 2016

• Completed: December 2016

• Target: Global provider of supply chain solutions to life sciences industry, leader in clinical trials

• Significance: Major entry into clinical trials logistics; Marken continues making sub-acquisitions

DHL Healthcare Acquisitions & Investment

1. SDS Rx

• Amount: Not disclosed

• Announced: September 9, 2025

• Completed: November 7, 2025

• Target: Provider of final-mile delivery and specialized healthcare transportation for long-term care/specialty pharmacies, radiopharmacies, health system networks (200+ US locations)

• Significance: Adds final-mile healthcare delivery capabilities; second healthcare acquisition for DHL in 2025

2. CRYOPDP

• Amount: Not disclosed

• Date: March 31, 2025 (announced and completed)

• Acquired from: Cryoport

• Target: Leading specialty courier focused on clinical trials, biopharma, cell and gene therapies

• Significance: Strengthens specialized biopharma transport for advanced therapies; first healthcare acquisition for DHL in 2025

Announced Investments

• DHL healthcare has announced €2 billion (~$2.2 billion USD) to be invested over 5 years (2025-2030) to enhance life sciences and healthcare logistics capabilities, expand cold chain capacity, transform Florstadt campus into European pharmaceutical hub, add 20+ cross-dock facilities

Baseline approach: Push all events by shipper account

A common industry pattern is: emit all tracking events for all shipments associated with a given shipper account (e.g., an API key / customer account). This works for a narrow set of use cases, but it’s not sufficient for the broader market.

If shipper-account push is the only model you support, you force downstream consumers to build workarounds (or you block key partner integrations entirely).

Know your real consumers: Who actually needs tracking?

In modern shipping workflows, the shipper is often not the primary consumer of tracking events. The real demand comes from an ecosystem of third parties, including:

• marketplaces and retail channels

• payment providers

• ticketing/support systems

• analytics platforms

• consolidators and 3PLs/fulfillment providers

• customs brokers

• insurance providers

• other operational partners and internal tools

Requiring each shipper to individually integrate your carrier tracking into each partner system creates unnecessary friction and puts your customers at a disadvantage versus carriers that support partner-friendly subscription models.

Recommended: Subscription API for tracking-ID–scoped webhooks

Provide an API that allows authorized parties to subscribe to tracking updates for a specific Tracking ID (or shipment identifier). This enables ecosystem partners to receive events directly, without requiring the shipper to relay data.

Key properties of this model:

• subscriptions are scoped (per Tracking ID / shipment)

• subscriptions are authorized (who can subscribe is enforced)

• events are push-based (webhook delivery)

Subscription responses: Validation and error handling

The subscription endpoint should return explicit, developer-friendly responses that make it unambiguous whether the subscription was created.

At minimum

:

• confirmation that the subscription is active (or pending)

• the scope (e.g., Tracking ID, carrier, account)

• a unique subscription ID

• clear error codes/messages when it fails (and why), such as:

  • invalid Tracking ID

  • unauthorized / insufficient permissions

  • invalid webhook URL or failed verification challenge

  • duplicate subscription

  • rate limit / quota exceeded

Mid-journey subscriptions: Handling historical events

A subscription may be created after a shipment has already started moving. In that case, partners typically need the full event history to establish state (current status, milestone timestamps, exceptions, etc.).

Two common approaches:

Option A (basic): Separate “get history” API

Provide a REST endpoint to fetch historical tracking events. The consumer must:

1. call the history API, then

2. start listening to the webhook, then

3. merge/dedupe events by event ID / timestamp.

Option B (best): Return history on subscription creation

When creating the subscription, return any existing historical events (if available) in the subscription response. This allows the consumer to become consistent immediately without implementing a two-step bootstrap flow.

Data Privacy Compliance

To understand more on how carriers can provide shipment tracking while staying compliant with data privacy frameworks such as GDPR, CCPA, and PDPA, check out this article on Why Carriers Need DPAs for Tracking Data.

Returnless Return

What it means: A return where a refund, exchange, or replacement is provided without the requiring the original product to be sent back.

Why it’s bad: Term itself is a paradox - a self contradiction. It’s like the Orderless Order, Paymentless Payment, Claimless Claim, or the Questionless Question. I

Better Term: Conceptually the buyer intends to return a product and receive a refund in exchange, so how about "Free Refund" or "Free Exchange" which implies that the customer gets the refund anyway without having to provide the returned product?

Global to Global

Context: A number of companies have used the term "Global to Global" to describe different carrier or logistics services.

Why It’s Bad: What does this even mean? Does that mean you can ship from anywhere in the world to anywhere in the world? The carrier probably can’t, and that’s why this description is both confusing and bordering absurd. Destinations are usually well covered through the postal network, but who can offer any origin in the world?

Better Term: Just stick with “Global Shipping” — it works.

Fulfilment-As-A-Service (FAAS)

What is means: Ecommerce fulfillment, but by calling it FAAS, it sounds cool because it’s like SAAS. And it makes you think that you only pay for what you use.

SAAS history lesson: In the past, especially pre-cloud, people used to buy software which came in a physical box, and on physical disks which they then installed onto their computers. The purchase was one-off and the user owned the right to use that version of software indefinitely. The internet allowed software developers to license software-as-a-service (SAAS) and users no longer owned a copy of the software.

Why it’s bad: Adding “as-a-service” to something that is already a service is redundant. Fulfilment has always been a service. This would be like calling a barber shop “Hair cut as a service” or calling an garage shop oil change “Oil change as a service” or a dental clinic “Dentistry as a service.”

Cloud Fulfillment

What is means: Fulfillment companies that have a have a web based customer portal.

Why it’s bad: Cloud is supposed to refer applications running on a true cloud infrastructure rather than locally or on-premise. Calling it cloud fulfillment makes it sounds like your goods are being virtually picked, packed, and shipped in the digital world only. And buyers of fulfillment services never had to install software anyway. Calling it cloud fulfilment is weird.

End to End

What is means: Not just a logistics term, but companies from all industries love referring to their product as end-to-end.

What it’s bad: Nobody knows FROM which end and TO which end you’re referring to. Some carriers indicate that they ship parcels “end to end” only for you to discover that your “end” should start at your warehouse, but the carrier’s starting end means you deliver it to their sorting centre in another city. That doesn’t sound like end to end to me at all. Shouldn’t they be picking the product up from your factory in China directly?

What: DELIVER Europe
Where: Taets Art and Event Park in Zaandam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
When: 3-4 June 2026
Price: FREE for Qualified Brands & Retailers

For retail and supply chain leaders across Europe, June 2026 is shaping up to be a defining moment. DELIVER Europe returns to Amsterdam, transforming the industrial-chic Taets Art and Event Park into a high-stakes hub for over 1,000 C- and D-level executives from the world’s most influential brands.

This isn’t just another trade show. It’s a precision-engineered ecosystem designed to cut through the noise of traditional conferences. If you’re tired of aimless networking and crowded expo floors, DELIVER’s hosted model built around pre-qualified, one-to-one matchmaking offers a refreshing change.

The Hosted VIP Experience: What’s Included?

For qualified retail and brand leaders, DELIVER offers a fully hosted experience that removes the friction of event attendance. A VIP Pass isn’t just a ticket; it’s a comprehensive package that includes:

•Precision Matchmaking: Pre-arranged 1-to-1 meetings with solution
providers hand-picked to match your specific business needs and active projects.

•Full Hospitality: Complimentary accommodation and gourmet catering throughout the event.

•Exclusive Access: Entry to all content sessions, the Elite Dinner (invite-only), Women in Retail Breakfast (invite-only) and the legendary networking parties.

•Seamless Logistics: Access to DELIVER-arranged shuttle services and dedicated account management to handle your schedule.

Apply for Your VIP Pass

The 2026 Agenda: Beyond the Buzzwords

This year’s edition promises a full agenda tackling the challenges and opportunities shaping the industry. Attendees can explore themes across:

• Artificial Intelligence – from workforce transformation to risk management.

• Net-Zero and Sustainability – practical strategies for circular and low-carbon supply chains.

• Cross-Chain Collaboration – breaking silos and improving visibility across the supply network.

• Supply Chain Leadership – human-centric, purpose-driven approaches to managing complex operations.

The “Elite” Factor

One of the hallmarks of the DELIVER experience is the Elite Dinner on June 3rd. This invite-only gathering has become a staple for industry pioneers to connect in a more intimate, high-level setting. It’s where the real conversations happen away from the stage and into the future of commerce.

Why It Matters

Whether you are looking to stress-test your current tech stack or find the partners who will help you navigate the next decade of cross-border commerce, DELIVER Europe is where the heavy hitters gather. The hosted experience means the logistics are handled, so you can focus entirely on what matters: outcomes.

Event Floorplan

Space is already limited! Book now to avoid missing out

Book Your Ticket Now

Who’s Showing Up?

The floor is packed with the movers and shakers of the logistics world. Here’s a snapshot of the partners already locked in:

🔘 Premier Sponsors: DP World & Geopost

🔘 The Parcel Carriers: GLS, Emirates, DHL, Maersk, Spring, Asendia, FedEx, EVRI, Landmark Global, Postnord, Swissport

🔘 Software & Tech: Zonos, Manhattan Associates, CIRRO, HIVED, PARCEL.ONE

🔘 Fulfilment & Freight: Maersk, Zencargo

🔘 Ecosystem Partners: Claimit, Taxually, Modern Expo, Nash

The First Speakers

Register for Deliver

What: e-Logi Fest 2026
Where: Karen Demirchyan Sports and Concert Complex | Yerevan, Armenia
When: 5–7 June 2026
Price: FREE for Professional Visitors (Registration Required)

From June 5–7, 2026, logistics and e-commerce leaders will converge at the strategic junction of Europe and Asia. e-Logi Fest returns to Yerevan, transforming the landmark Karen Demirchyan Complex into a high-octane meeting point for the world’s most innovative supply chain thinkers.

More than a trade fair, this is an industry-focused festival designed to bridge the gap between digital retail demands and physical logistics reality.

Why Attend?

For importers, exporters, manufacturers, and retailers, e-Logi Fest provides a frictionless environment to scale operations. Your professional pass grants you exclusive access to:

• International Connectivity: Direct access to freight forwarders, courier services, and postal providers from the EU, EAEU, and beyond.

• The Tech Stack of Tomorrow: Explore live demos of warehouse automation, AI-driven fulfillment, and smart tracking systems.

• Strategic Sourcing: Unlock event-only partnerships, special discounts, and business opportunities unavailable anywhere else.

• Targeted Networking: A curated environment to connect with decision-makers, platform operators, and global manufacturers.

“e-Logi Fest is where the region’s logistics DNA is being rewritten.”

Register for Your Professional Pass

The 2026 Agenda: Intelligence in Motion

This year’s summit tackles the massive shifts redefining global trade corridors:

• Smart Supply Chains: Leveraging real-time data to solve fragmented market challenges.

• Cross-Border Mastery: Navigating the complexities of international shipping and last-mile delivery.

• The AI Shift: Practical applications of AI, from route optimization to predictive inventory.

• Sustainability: Moving toward circular and low-carbon supply chains in emerging markets.

  

Who’s On the Floor?

The floor is packed with industry movers and shakers, including:

• Logistics Giants: DHL eCommerce, FedEx, and regional postal leaders.

• E-com Powerhouses: Wildberries, Yandex Go, and Amazon-ready fulfillment partners.

• Tech Innovators: Intel Corporation, Parcel Perform, and Zonos.

• Ecosystem Partners: Regional trade ministries, customs facilitators, and Fintech providers.

  

  Regiter Now

  
  
  

But this isn’t just another merger. This is the latest, and perhaps most audacious, move in a calculated game being played by one of the most aggressive and successful software investors in the world. Given the size of the deal, I think we should ask ourselves:

Who Are These Guys?

Forget the polished website and the pictures of smiling executives. Thoma Bravo, founded by Orlando Bravo, is a private equity machine that has perfected the art of the software buyout. They manage over $181 billion in assets and have a simple, ruthless, and wildly profitable strategy: find a good software company, buy it, make it more profitable, and sell it for a huge return.

They are not logistics guys. They are software guys. And they see the fragmented, complex world of logistics technology not as a series of operational challenges, but as a massive opportunity for consolidation. As one Forbes writer put it when Thoma Bravo bought Coupa Software, they are the “Barbarians at the Gate” of the supply chain world. And now, they’re not just at the gate — they’re rebuilding Rome.

The Playbook, Step by Step

What Thoma Bravo is doing is a repeatable, five-step playbook they have run over and over again across the software industry. The Auctane/WWEX deal is just the latest chapter.

Step 1: Identify the Platform

It starts with finding a market leader in a fragmented industry. The company needs to be good, but not too good. Maybe it’s inefficient, maybe its growth has stalled, or maybe it’s a public company struggling with quarterly earnings pressure. In 2021, they found their perfect platform: Stamps.com (formerly Nasdaq: STAMPS). For a cool $6.6 billion, they took the company private.

Step 2: Rebrand and Roll-Up

Once private, Stamps.com was rebranded as Auctane. This new entity became the “platform” for a classic “buy and build” strategy. Thoma Bravo used Auctane to go on a shopping spree, rolling up a huge chunk of the e-commerce shipping software market. ShipStation, ShippingEasy, ShipWorks, Metapack, Endicia — all these familiar names now live under the Auctane umbrella. Each acquisition consolidated their market power.

Step 3: Load It With Debt

Here’s where the financial engineering comes in. These deals are rarely paid for with cash on hand. They are leveraged buyouts (LBOs), meaning the acquired company is saddled with the debt used to buy it. For this latest WWEX merger, Thoma Bravo secured over $5 billion in a single unitranche financing deal from a syndicate of 33 lenders — including Blackstone, Ares, Apollo, and Oaktree.

This debt has to be serviced, which puts immense pressure on the newly formed company to cut costs and increase revenue. If that sounds familiar, it should. It’s the exact same playbook that killed Toys “R” Us. In 2005, KKR, Bain Capital, and Vornado bought the company for $6.6 billion, but loaded it with over $5.3 billion in debt. The interest payments alone — hundreds of millions of dollars a year — choked the company, preventing it from investing in its stores or e-commerce, and ultimately drove it into bankruptcy. The debt, not the business, is what wiped it off the face of the earth.

Step 4: The Grand Combination

After consolidating the software side, the playbook calls for a bigger move. By merging the pure-tech Auctane with the asset-heavy 3PL operations of WWEX Group — Worldwide Express, GlobalTranz, Unishippers — Thoma Bravo has created a vertically integrated behemoth. The new entity doesn’t just provide the software to print a label; it can now manage the entire journey from checkout to doorstep.

Step 5: The Exit

Private equity firms are not long-term holders. The end goal is always the exit. In a few years, expect Thoma Bravo to either sell this new, larger, more dominant entity to another company or take it public in a massive IPO. The $12 billion valuation is just the starting point.

The Broader Logistics Tech Takeover

To think this is just about one company is to miss the forest for the trees. Thoma Bravo is strategically buying up the key control points of modern logistics, and the scale of their investment is staggering. Between 2021 and 2026, they have deployed over $20 billion into just three major logistics tech platforms:

•Coupa Software (2023, $8 billion): A leader in business spend management with deep ties into supply chain and procurement.

•project44 (2022, $420 million investment, $2.2 billion valuation): The market leader in supply chain visibility.

•Auctane + WWEX (2026, ~$12 billion combined): The shipping software and freight brokerage combination.

The Elephant in the Room: Are These Companies Actually Tech?

Here’s the conversation that has been happening in boardrooms and at industry conferences for years, and one that this deal makes impossible to ignore any longer.

Auctane’s brands — ShipStation, Stamps.com, Endicia, ShippingEasy — belong to a category commonly called shipping aggregators. They sit between the shipper and the carrier, providing software to compare rates, print labels, and manage shipments. Competitors in this space include Shippo, Easyship, and EasyPost. On the freight side, the same model exists with companies like Flexport, and the now-defunct Convoy.

The fundamental question the industry has never been able to answer cleanly is this: are these businesses technology companies, SaaS companies, operations companies, or some hybrid of all three? And the answer matters enormously, because the category you land in determines your valuation.

Pure SaaS companies — the kind Thoma Bravo typically hunts — can trade at anywhere from 5x to over 20x revenue, depending on their growth. Traditional logistics companies, on the other hand, are lucky to get 1.5x revenue. The gap between those two numbers is enormous, and it’s the gap that has made the logistics tech space such a magnet for venture capital and private equity over the past decade.

The uncomfortable truth, however, is that the market has never — not once, in any sustained way — rewarded shipping aggregators and freight tech companies with genuine SaaS multiples. Not Stamps.com, which was consistently undervalued by public markets despite beating earnings expectations before Thoma Bravo took it private at $6.6 billion.

Not Flexport, which raised at a reported $8 billion valuation in 2022 and has been chasing profitability ever since. And certainly not Convoy, which raised $925 million, peaked at a $3.8 billion valuation in 2022, and was completely gone by October 2023.

Convoy’s story is worth dwelling on for a moment, because it is the clearest case study of what happens when a logistics company is valued like a tech company. The pitch was elegant: use machine learning to digitize freight matching the way Uber digitized rideshare. It worked beautifully during the COVID freight boom. Then spot rates collapsed by 40%+ in 2022 and 2023, and the entire model fell apart.

Convoy had no assets to fall back on, no physical capacity to leverage, and no relationship-based stickiness to retain shippers when the market turned. Flexport stepped in to buy the tech stack for pennies on the dollar. A tech company is not supposed to fall apart when shipping rates drops.

The pattern repeats itself across the industry. These companies start their lives positioned as technology companies, raise venture capital at tech company valuations, and then spend years trying to justify those valuations in a market that ultimately views them as logistics businesses. The boardroom debate about whether they are “tech” or “ops” is not just philosophical — it has real consequences for how these companies are funded, managed, and ultimately valued at exit.

This raises a genuinely interesting question, and one I don’t think anyone has a clean answer to: are these businesses structurally incapable of sustaining SaaS valuations, or have we simply not yet seen the right company execute the right model? The cousin industries — freight forwarding platforms like Flexport, digital freight brokerages like Convoy and Transfix — have all faced the same ceiling. Even the most tech-forward of them eventually gets repriced as a logistics business when the cycle turns.

The market is right to be skeptical. The economics of moving physical goods are fundamentally different from the economics of moving data. Gross margins in logistics are thin by nature. Customer acquisition is expensive. Churn is high because switching costs are low — a shipper can move from ShipStation to Shippo in an afternoon. And the business is brutally cyclical in a way that pure software never is. Until someone builds a shipping aggregator with 80%+ gross margins, 120%+ net revenue retention, and a defensible moat that doesn’t evaporate in a shipping price war, the market will keep applying a logistics discount.

So What Does This Mean for Thoma Bravo’s Bet?

Thoma Bravo is smart enough to know all of this. The question is whether they’ve found a way around it.

The thesis behind the Auctane/WWEX merger seems to be that combining the software layer with the physical freight, warehouse, and parcel layer creates something that is genuinely more defensible than either business alone. A shipper who uses ShipStation for their e-commerce labels and then routes their freight through Worldwide Express becomes stickier than a shipper who uses ShipStation alone. The data flywheel — knowing both the software preferences and the freight patterns of a customer — could theoretically create the kind of lock-in that justifies a higher valuation.

Whether that plays out in practice is a different question. The history of logistics mergers is full of deals that made perfect sense on a whiteboard and fell apart in execution. Remember Sendle in Australia — a promising company, a well-intentioned merger, and then a collapse that left thousands of customers scrambling. The $5 billion debt load sitting on top of this new entity is not forgiving. It demands results, and it demands them quickly.

For the thousands of small and medium-sized e-commerce businesses that rely on these platforms, the consolidation is a double-edged sword. In the short term, nothing may change. But in the long term, fewer choices, less competition, and almost certainly higher prices tend to follow when one company owns ShipStation, Stamps.com, ShippingEasy, and Metapack all at once.

This is the new reality of logistics tech. A world being reshaped not by operators in warehouses, but by financiers in boardrooms. And while it may be a brilliant playbook for generating returns, the final cost to the industry’s innovation and competitiveness has yet to be tallied.

If you’re looking for a guest speaker, analyst, or consultant for your project, company, or event, reach out.

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CeMAT South East Asia, the world’s leading trade fair for intralogistics, materials handling, and supply chain management, returns to Singapore EXPO from 12–14 May 2026 is organised by Hannover Fairs Australia, a subsidiary of the renowned Deutsche Messe. This event has established itself as a critical platform for the “warehouse of the future”.

I’m personally presenting at the Knowledge Theatre this year, but first, here is why this event is a non-negotiable for your 2026 calendar.

A Global Hub for Innovation

As a cornerstone of the international CeMAT portfolio—joining events in Australia, China, Italy, and Turkey—the Southeast Asia edition is a genuine convergence of industry leaders and practitioners. This year’s exhibition floor will feature over 65 companies, including industry giants like Dematic, Honeywell, Hyster-Yale, and Geek+.

Expect to see cutting-edge solutions in:

• Robotics and Warehouse Automation

• Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMRs) and conveyor systems

• Cold Chain Developments

• Digital Systems for operational performance

This year, CeMAT SEA is co-located with CargoNOW Singapore, a dedicated platform for the cargo, freight, and supply chain sectors. This partnership provides an expanded environment to evaluate end-to-end solutions, from the warehouse floor to global freight.

The Knowledge Theatre: Insights for the Next Era

The Knowledge Theatre serves as the event’s thought-leadership hub. Free for all attendees, it will host over 20 sessions featuring distinguished speakers exploring how AI and digital systems enhance resilience.

Key Themes Include:

• The AI Revolution in Logistics: Moving beyond theory into practical application.

• Scalable Automation for SMEs: Making high-tech accessible for smaller operations.

• Future-Ready Intralogistics: Building for long-term efficiency.

• Sustainable and Secure Supply Chains: Addressing global modern challenges.

Skills, Networking, and Recognition

Beyond the tech, CeMAT SEA is about the people who move the world:

• Southeast Asia Forklift Championship: A dynamic competition where drivers are tested on precision, speed, and safety in real-world warehouse conditions.

• Networking Function (May 12th): A relaxed evening on the show floor to exchange ideas and build relationships.

• LogiSYM Awards Gala (May 13th): A signature celebration of the co-located LogiSYM Asia Pacific 2026 conference, recognizing standout contributions to the industry.

Why I’m There

I’m honored to be presenting at the Knowledge Theatre this year. I’ll be sharing insights on ecommerce logistics and cross-border supply chain—topics that are rapidly reshaping how we think about regional fulfillment. Stay tuned for more details on my specific session time.

The Logistics at a Glance

As the supply chain landscape evolves at a rapid pace, CeMAT SEA 2026 offers a vital opportunity to stay ahead of the curve. Whether you are a veteran or an emerging talent, I look forward to seeing you there.

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J&T Express, a company with terrible LinkedIn presence, has become officially become the 2nd largest parcel carrier in the world announcing that it delivered 30.12B parcels in 2025, up 22.2%.

If you don’t know J&T listen up.

The carrier company founded in Indonesia (population 285 million) rapidly expanded into China (population 1.4 billion) and is now expanding into LATAM with strong results in Brazil.

It’s publicly listed so feel free to check them out yourself.

UPS isn’t fairing so well with recent losses in volumes, it will likely fall further from the list without a growth strategy.

United States Postal Service is focused on it’s business at home and it’s not clear if they will ever have an international play like PostNL, Australia Post, La Poste Groupe, bpost have done with their companies Spring GDS - Global, APG eCommerce Solutions, Asendia, Landmark Global.

The trend is obvious. Chinese carriers dominate thanks to the size of the Chinese ecommerce market, but the other trend I see is that Chinese companies are rapidly expanding into markets outside of China and staking a claim in ground delivery all around the world - something that the American companies never did successfully.

Amazon Logistics bucks that trend and it is rapidly growing especially via Amazon Shipping spinning off as a standalone carrier service.

Top Carriers by Revenue

While Chinese carriers dominate due to China’s position as the world’s #1 ecommerce market, and active expansion, the revenues from developing markets is nothing like it is in the developed West, and so if we compare volumes to revenue, we get a very different story.

In a complete role reversal DHL, UPS, FedEx, aka The Big 3, retain the top positions as expected. SF Express is worth mentioning here. It’s the biggest Chinese carrier and services the premium market in China. While far from the Big 3, given China and Asia’s growth rates, SF might be within striking distance of the Big 3 in 5 years.

Long term, FedEx’s acquisition of InPost puts it in a fantastic position to grow. DHL’s highly diversified business is it’s strength as well. UPS still lacks a big growth story - but maybe it doesn’t need to, or not does it care, because healthcare margins are fantastic — that is until Amazon decides it wants Amazon Pharmacy to get into Pharmaceutical logistics as well.

Question: When are we going to see an India carrier on this list? I’m waiting for a Delhivery (FedEx is an investor), or Blue Dart (DHL is an investor) to make it onto this list soon.

Warning: While this post is not about ecommerce logistics, it’s relevant to any marketers in the ecommerce logistics ecosystem - so forward it to your marketing teams!

I post a lot on LinkedIn, and so I often get asked if posting content on LinkedIn can help companies get sales if they’re in professional services, SAAS, or logistics?

Usually this is from a company that has posted for a few weeks on their company channel, or done a few posts on their personal channel, and didn’t see any immediately attributable conversion.

The problem with trying to attribute ROI on content normally stems from a misunderstanding of what content is and how it impacts the modern B2B buyer journey.

Good content informs, educates, or entertains - and in today’s highly distracted society, “entertainment is the only currency today that can purchase the attention of a too-distracted public.” - Roy H Williams

Good content helps to build an audience and “audiences are an are an asset with quantifiable value” - Robert Rose Chief Strategy Advisor of CMI.

The problem with most companies, however, is that they’re stuck on outdated last touch attribution concepts, and they don’t understand the modern buyer’s journey.

Most companies I see are stuck on some form of McKinsey’s Consumer Decision Journey which visualizes the customer as going on a predictable straight line happy path where every marketing touch point pushes them closer to becoming a customer.

This is totally wrong for today’s highly distracted and overly informed world, and it’s exacerbated by popular CRM designs which model their UI’s around the same straight line funnelling.

Google’s Messy Middle Framework more aptly descriptions the realty of today’s buyer - going through multiple loops of exploration and evaluation until they one day end up as a customer.

For B2B, however, where buyers are have real pain points to solve and goals to achieve, the journey is more like a slow crawl from 0 to CLOSE, with maybe was many as 50 touch points.

In today’s highly distracted and overly informed society, buyers are constantly getting micro signals which takes them through peaks and troughs of their pain points and goals.

Just think about yourself. You’ve bought products and services for your company.

Did you follow the McKinsey straight line?

1. I have a pain point!

2. Let me Google various providers

3. Next I’ll visit their websites

4. Fill out the forms

5. Have sales call with them all

6. Have a follow up calls with a short list

7. Ask for a quote from the final 1-2

8. Sign a contract

That’s the old world. It doesn’t exist anymore.

The modern B2B buyer’s experience is totally different from what last generation marketers tell you. In today’s highly distracted world of overwhelming information, the journey looks totally different.

1. Buyers start to feel some pain, not necessarily aware that they need to solve it, or they set some goals which they already have a plan for

2. Over months or years they see relevant content that informs, educates, or entertains them related to both their pain, and the possible solution(s) in the market, while in parallel

2. Their pain point or goals continue to grow until they hit a point where they are ready to pull the trigger

3. At this point they’ve already decided who they’re probably going to work with - the top 1-2 choices were already won over the months and years of seeing micro bits of content around their pain and the possibility solution, potentially as many as 50 touch points with a company

This is what I call, the Modern B2B Buyer Journey.

Two of the biggest excuses I usually hear at this point:

1. We can’t measure multi-touch attribution.

2. So instead we measure just the last-touch which is still better than measuring nothing at all.

While LinkedIn doesn’t show you all of the people who make up your impressions, LinkedIn does show you:

1. Who LIKED and commented on your posts - are you measuring them?

2. Who VIEWED your profile and your company’s profile - are you measuring them?

Measuring last-touch attribution is dangerous because once you understand the modern B2B buyer journey, last-touch attribution will lead you the WRONG conclusion.

There’s a reason that events and dinners have the highest ROI: because you were able to measure them.

If measuring multi-touch attribution is truly a challenge, an alternative quantifiable goal might be something like “We intend to achieve a 20% increase of in-ICP visitors to our personal pages and company pages this quarter.”

I guarantee you that the more content you post that informs, educates, or entertains, the more pipeline you will see.

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Geopost, a parcel delivery conglomerate that owns massive carrier brands like DPD, Asendia, La Poste, etc. has launched Singular, a directory for webshops of their customers in Europe.

According to Geopost it is “a digital platform designed to (1) offer consumers a new shopping experience while (2) unlocking new business opportunities for SMEs. (3) Singular provides consumers with access to unique and authentic products from selected local brands.”

The way it does this is by offering a “virtual storefront” experience which it promotes to “through Geopost’s social medias, websites and local delivery management apps, including myDPD, myBRT, miSEUR.”

The Marketplace-Directory Evolution

In the early days of the internet bubble, the first marketplaces were born and directly fought each other for dominance. Today many like Amazon and eBay thrive, while many are gone. By the 2010’s waves of internet companies that had obtained some kind of scale have tried to create marketplaces and directories on the premise that “We know a lot of merchants.”

Strategy wise this is a terrible idea. Almost all B2B vendors of any scale have a lot of customers. Knowing a lot of them provides almost no competitive advantage to build a successful directory or marketplace.

I cannot tell you how many times I have been approached be part of a new marketplace or directory project from companies in payment/fintech, logistics, SAAS, manufacturing and supply chain, and once even a packaging company!

Many have tried, all have died.

Why did they fail?

The marketplace business model has been covered and written about by people a lot smarter than me. I recommend reading “The Cold Start Problem” by Andreessen Horowitz’s Andrew Chen. However let’s just say that the critical success factors for building a marketplace-directory business includes

1. Managing Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC)

2. Increasing Average Over Value (AOV), Lifetime Value (LTV)

3. Reducing Churn (the inverse of which is improving retention)

It was often believed that acquiring merchants was the hardest part of running a marketplace, but it was not. Marketplaces would often say “If only I could get Nike’s on my marketplace, then users would buy from us!” But it turns out that even if you have Nike’s on your marketplace, if you are not driving significant traffic to your site, nobody will know about it.

And even if you bought enough traffic to get that visitor, convincing them to migrate from Amazon to your marketplace was hard. If you did get the first sale, hopefully not through incentives, getting them to come back as equally challenging.

Again learned 2 important things:

1. Acquiring customers is very expensive

2. Retaining them and growing AOV and LTV is very hard

There is a better strategy

Instead of creating the marketplace first, Geopost should create a consumer super tracking app, so that it can own a direct relationship with consumers. This would create:

1. High frequency recurring touch points (checking app daily for ecom deliveries)

2. Significant data on consumers (what they buy, where they buy)

These touch points become ad inventory which the Geopost could then use to serve personalized merchant ads to consumers and recommend specific purchases.

This solves the high CAC problem of obtaining eyeballs through organic tracking usage as the traffic and user acquisition tool.

User churn on a carrier’s native tracking app like Geopost or DPD would be very low, making user numbers even more attractive.

While some data science work would be needed, once they figure it out, serving personalized product recommendations to customers based on data can be very powerful.

Carrier tracking apps are not new. Carriers already have their own carrier tracking apps, but of them are going the route of Super App.

Geoposts’ strategy is not bad at all, it just needs a little fine tuning.

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Who Attends?

Attendees are heads of supply chain, logistics, and ecommerce from vetted brands and retailers that are buyers of logistics services. Attendees are provided with free access to the entire conference, 1 night’s free accommodation and travel subsidies to attend. Exhibitors ultimately are paying for this, and the benefit is Deliver’s unique format that ensures exhibitors have a full slate of 1:1 meetings with quality companies before they event arrive.

Hilton Dubai Al Habtoor City

The conference venue and hotel was the Hilton Dubai Al Habtoor City, a 5-star hotel, which felt like a luxurious upgrade. Deliver wanted to make a good first year impression, and it did.

Upon arrival you’re immediately aware of the multiple restaurants, bars, pools, and even a world class Cirque du Soleil style show called La Perle at the hotel - talk about a huge hotel!

Conference Floor

Middle East had the smallest conference floor among Deliver events, which has the benefit of creating a crozier and more intimate atmosphere. Deliver Americas and Europe give off the big conference show vibe with thousands of people coming and going - most of whom you will never know - but the Dubai had a homely feeling to it, probably because of the nice carpet and comfortable lighting.

Less exhibitors mean more time listening to the content series and also more time networking.

DP World was the main sponsor of the event as their both was lively. DP World’s stand always seems similar at each Deliver, and I realized that I had seem a similar style booth when I was last in Dubai for the UPU Postal Congress. Is this just a popular modern Middle Eastern style booth?

I was surprised to find a significant number of Dubai based ecommerce logistics companies missing. I would have expected Aramex to be there given they exhibit at other Delivers and local postal group 7X was not there either. Perhaps they were waiting to see how things would turn on this year?

The People

One of Deliver’s USP’s is quality attendees and Middle East did not disappoint. Tom Meek of Taxually told us that “All the brands we’ve spoken to are $100M+” and Blue Yonder’s Justine Lacombe indicated that exhibiting was “was a no brainer. The attendees are HIGH quality.” Not a single exhibitor we spoke to was disappointed and that’s a great start for a conference.

Food Reveal

This year’s Deliver had an unexpected twist - meat! Yes after consistently attending Deliver Events for 3 years, I had come to expect vegetarian, so imagine my surprise when I saw this great big tray of chicken!

Besides lunch, breakfasts, brunch snacks, and afternoon snacks were widely abundant.

My primary complaint for big conference events have always been the hotel canteen style food. I’d love to see logistics conferences learn from events like SXSW and hit us local cuisine and food to tasty that attendees would line up for it. If I’m only in Dubai for 2 days, it would be nice to try local food.

Fortunately there was tea and coffee shop across the street and I was able to get my fill of Karak Chai, the local milk tea, for the day.

Rooftop Food, Drinks, and Music

Deliver Middle East’s Day 1 after party was at the rooftop, full of food (slightly more localized yay), full of drinks, and had a DJ. It was great to finally go outside for a little bit and watch as half the attendees froze their asses off in the Dubai winter - and I’m not being sarcastic it was really cold!

The fun is always my favourite part and where I think a lot of the real business gets done. Not because of the alcohol, but because it’s easier to get to know people when you’re relaxed and no longer on business speed dating mode.

The Market

I normally don’t blog about a hotel breakfast, but one of the biggest selling points of staying at the Hilton is The Market. I know several attendees and exhibitors that intentionally avoided more after-partying so that they could enjoy the hotel, sleep early and crush the hotel breakfast.

Final Verdict

If you’re a retailer, you should check out what’s happening in the GCC and Deliver Middle East is a great platform. A well organized event with good content, 1:1 meetings, and a comfortable luxury hotel during Dubai’s winter time is a great combination.

If you’re an exhibitor, this year’s exhibitors had great things to say. If you were on the fence before, consider trying it next year - but only if you have a Middle East angle.

Next Up: Deliver Asia, Singapore

To experience Deliver, consider attending Deliver Asia in Singapore March 4-5. I’ll be there and as usual taking meetings in and out of the venue. Suntec City has a few great spots for Teh Tarik, and if you’re not a regularly we’ll also get a Kaya Toast with our milk tea

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BREAKING: FedEx has just announced it’s MOST IMPORTANT strategic acquisition since TNT: purchasing out-of-home golden boy InPost for $9.2B USD! Why does this change the game for ecommerce logistics? 👇

Unless you forgot to follow me, you will know InPost has been the golden boy of ecommerce logistics for the past 2 years.

The Out-Of-Home darling from Poland is printing money hand-over-fist, reporting nearly $300M in adjusted EBITA in Q3 alone, and it’s using that cash-printing machine in the most brilliant way possible:

1️⃣ Acquire a stagnated last mile parcel delivery company at scale

2️⃣ Direct all those parcels to Out-Of-Home

3️⃣ GET RICH $$$

In the past few years it’s acquired local last mile leaders in Yodel (Yodel Delivery Network Ltd) UK, Sending Transporte y Logística Spain, Mondial Relay France, and more . . .

Meanwhile, across the Pacific, FedEx has had a great-but-uneventful few years as it deprioritized revenue and volume growths and focused on huge initiatives like DRIVE to merge it’s ground and express infrastructure - which makes 100% sense BTW.

However, FedEx has not been able to capture the rapid growth of global ecommerce innovation in the same way that InPost has been able to do.

Chinese “Dragons” like SHEIN, Temu, and Cainiao Group (part of Alibaba) largely pass their massive volumes down to lower cost asset light start-ups and competitors and the local post like United States Postal Service.

Decoupling with Amazon Shipping has also resulted in Amazon Shipping becoming one of the fastest growing direct competitors of FedEx.

Therefore, up until today, FedEx's growth strategy was uncertain. With InPost under it's belt, however, even if not a full on acquisition:

1️⃣ FedEx gains massive new opportunities to do more in Europe, enabling it to play the private ground infrastructure game where globally it is only rivalled by UPS

2️⃣ InPost potentially obtains more OOH feeder volume in markets where FedEx has a strong ground and last mile service, including previous TNT strongholds

3️⃣ FedEx gains the expertise of the #1 OOH company in the world as it’s alley should it decide to get into the US, where parcel lockers are still early and where Happy Returns, a UPS Company is the dominant player

4️⃣ Both companies can then evaluate new markets together such as LATAM, GCC, and SEA (where I don’t think they’ll make it 😅 )

I would only caution the group to learn from FedEx‘s $4.9B acquisition of TNT in 2016 which till today I don’t think has been fully integrated to FedEx (please correct me if wrong), and to avoid sinking another billion dollars of salaries and consultant fees on integration this time around.

That’s probably why FedEx decided against a full acquisition - so that InPost could continue it’s winning business model with minimum intervention.

Overall today is a very happy day for FedEx and InPost shareholders. Congratulations to them both.

This article as been syndicated from our LinkedIn channel. We felt it was important enough to be both here and on LinkedIn as well. If you’re not subscribed to our blog, please join us!

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While Sendle is not particularly well known in the US and has little European footprint, it was a highly regarded and beloved player in the shipping label aggregation space. Think of it as like one of the ShipStation’s or Parcel2Go’s for Australia.

Having raised more than $100M up till it’s Series-C round, and boasting a high market share in Australia while expanding in the US, customers and partners were understandably confused and sadded.

What happened to Sendle is a cautionary tale of deal making gone wrong.

FAST Group

Five months earlier on August 7, 2025, Sendle had announced a 3-way merger between themselves and two other US based logistics companies ACI Logistix and FirstMile. The merger was touted as creating a “dynamic ecosystem” for customers through synnergy from of the 3 businesses.

ACI Logistix had been in business for the past 60 years as national parcel logistics service provider with a strong history as a USPS reseller.

FirstMile was known for mid market solutions and provided national pickup infrastructure.

Combined with Sendle’s strong in-house technology and large SMB customer base, the merger made sense from marketing perspective.

(A fanfiction animation I created in VEO)

Cracks Start To Show

Within weeks of the merger, the group was short on cash. To salvage the situation, Sendle’s primary investor Federation Asset Management immediately injected $12M to keep the business operating while Fast Group attempted to raise as much as $60M in new financing.

Then on December 12, Federation Asset Management made a shocking discovery of their own, announcing that “Since the merger it has emerged that ACI Logistix was not current on its financial obligations at the time of the merge, contrary to representations made to Federation during the due diligence process.”

Among the discoveries: $20M owed to DoorDash, presumably for deliveries and not for take out.

In response, Federation froze additional withdrawals form it’s $100M Investment Fund II, which Fast Group was relying on for continued operating capital. Another investor in Sendle, Touch Ventures (ASX: TVL) immediately wrote down it’s $36M prior investment into Sendle to 0.

Unable to secure more funding to feed it’s cash hungry business, FAST’s board voted to wind down the company on Saturday January 10th, and by Sunday the 11th, Snedle’s email notice went out to customers.

What Really Happened

The tale of FAST Group is one of high stakes deal making from multiple parties gone terribly wrong.

On one hand, Sendle was a high growth VC backed startup taking a business risk that investing lots of money into it’s develping and growing business would create exit-worthy business.

Federation was the big money financial backer willing to pump tens of millions into this high risk venture in pursuit of VC like gains.

There is nothing wrong with this model whatsoever.

On the other hand, we have ACI Logistix. In light of the subsequent discoveries of the “significant deficiencies” in ACI’s financial statements, the question is whether the deficiencies were intentional misrepresentations or not. Was it incompetence, or was it the F-word?

Is it plauslabe that ACI Logistix, having previously been a major reseller of USPS, was several impacted by USPS’ decision to terminate reseller NSA’s (basically reseller rates) and end it’s DDP zone-skipping-enablement program?

Is it plausible that the $20M Door Dash payable is the result of ACI diverting shipments to whichever carrier could deliver ACI’s shipments, even if at a loss, as long as the carrier provided credit terms so that ACI could keep operating?

Is it plausible that ACI was drawn to Sendle largely in part of due to Federations deep pockets, which it had hoped would feel compelled to pump in any amount of cash necessary to save the combined FAST Group?

And the question that will probably be asked in a heated behind the scenes argument is: If Federation and Sendle had been aware of the true financial position, would they still have proceeded with the merger?

Lesson Learned

Logistics is not VC backable business. Logistics tech is VC backable, but the gray area is hybrid tech + ops. For every successful tech+ops case like Cainiao, there are 10 cases of tech+ops failures like Deliverr.

This won’t stop deal makers from trying, including the recently proposed $12B merger between Thoma Bravo’s Auctance and the WWEX group.

What Can Retailers Do Now

Fortunately Australian retailers who relied heavily on Sendle have several credible home grown alternatives to Sendle including Shippit, Interparcel, and StarShippit.

International players like Shipstation and Easyship are also available to use.

Sendle deserves credit for handling the situation in an orderly fashion.

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What: Deliver Asia
Where: Suntec Convention CE Singapore
When: 4-5 Mar 2026
Price: FREE ticket, $300 travel, and 1 night hotel for Brands & Retailers

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DELIVER Asia is coming back to Singapore for it’s 2nd year!

Senior retail and brand leaders from across Asia will gather for DELIVER Asia, a fully hosted experience designed for those shaping the future of commerce.

This is not another conference, but a precision matchmaking event built around pre-qualified, pre-booked one-to-one meetings between decision-makers and solution providers, held directly at the event. Qualified C-and D-level retail and brand leaders can apply for fully hosted passes, with accommodation, meals, and logistics covered, alongside access to tailored meetings, curated content, and exclusive networking.

With a curated agenda combining structured 1-to-1 meetings, senior-level content, and premium networking, DELIVER Asia is optimised for outcomes rather than scale. It will be interesting to see how it resonates with Asia’s retail leadership but for those fatigued by crowded expo floors and unstructured networking, this format is likely to feel like a deliberate shift in the right direction.

Partnered with the Brightest and Best in Supply Chain

Free Hotel and Travel

The Retails & Brand Elite Who Attends

Attendees include:

• Heads of Supply Chain, Logistics, Ecommerce, Operations and more

• Innovation, CX and Omnichannel leaders

• Strategic decision-makers exploring transformation

• 25+ supply chain solution providers pushing progress in the region

The Ecommerce Logistician is officially attending as a media partner - look forward to seeing you there.

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Is this move pure genius? Or a train wreck waiting to happen? Read on!

The Proposed $12B WWEX Group

On the outside the plan sounds brilliant. Auctane owns several market leaders in the label aggregation business, has 1M ecom customers, and is firmly a technology company.

WWE on the other hand is a logistics operator providing freight forwarding, trucking, warehousing and fulfillment, and also label resale - notably being a strong UPS reseller - and boasts 121K customers of their own.

Combining the two sounds like the perfect vertical integration of technology and logistics with infinite possibilities.

Deal Structure

To know what’s really happening, let’s follow the money:

1. Thoma Bravo is taking a new $5B loan, giving it cash

2. Thoma Bravo uses (1) cash and (2) some equity in the combined new company to (3) buy WWEX from it’s current owners for about $5-$6B

3. Thoma Bravo then merges WWEX and Auctane together into a new company (or existing)

4. Thoma Bravo then injects additional $500M into the group either for equity or as a loan

After the dust settles, WWEX will probably have a lot of cash in hand, maybe some debt due to them, and some equity in the new combined company, while Thoma Bravo will own the majority of the combined new company, which is probably loaded with debt up to its eyeballs.

Auctane was acquired by Thoma Bravo in 2021 in a $6.6 billion privatization deal, previously trading as Stamps.com.

Therefore Auctane $6B + WWEX $6B = $12B value for the new combined company. Illustration as follows:

Thoma Bravo’s Auctane Problem

Because Thoma Bravo fought Auctane at the peak of the market for SAAS valuations, it likely cannot get a good return from listing the company again. The market that Auctane is in is a brutally competitive market. In the US alone, competitors include Shippo, Easypost, PitneyBowes, Vesyl, Easyship, ShipperHQ, and many more. This is not typical kind of SAAS business that Thoma Bravo invests into where these companies are throwing off massive predictable cash flow. Thoma Bravo needs to figure out what to do with Auctane.

The Problem With This Merger

The biggest problem with this merger is that Auctane’s ICP is too different from WWEX’s.

Auctane services the smallest of SMBs, typically Shopify Core, Woocommerce, Wix, and other SMBs looking for a access to discounted carrier rates, a great dashboards and tech, rate comparisons, and a number of different value adds depending on which brand we are talking about. Their customers have micro to small volumes, infrequent shipments, and are very hands off DIY. Yes of course they have mid market and enterprise too.

WWEX customers, however, are the opposite. They are more scaled businesses that want customized services, high touch account management, and physical operations and services dominate their needs.

Trying to force Auctane customers into WWEX’s services would be painful for both parties, and WWEX customers don’t need Auctane.

History Lesson: Deliverr and Shipwire

Trying to merge tech companies with physical logistics companies has failed big time before.

Shopify acquired fulfillment company Deliverr for $2.1 billion in 2022 and that failed spectacularly, resulting in Shopify cancelling it’s Shopify Fulfilment program and selling Deliverr to Flexport for no cash and just a 13% stake in Flexport. You can read about why they failed from this Modern Retail article.

Shipwire is another tragedy to learn from. One on the first tech logistics companies, it was sold to Ingram Micro, a traditional distribution business, in 2013 where it languished until it was sold to CEVA logistics where it further declined into market irrelevance and it was just sold recently again to Stord. While there’s been no long expose that I could find on why it failed, anyone who has worked in traditional logistics knows that

What Would You Do

There are only a few major business model trends that fundamentally change the game for logistics companies right now:

1. Out of Home

2. Quick Commerce

3. AI and Automation (not just implementing, but being a tech company)

The first 2 are out of reach given the new WWEX Group’s lack of last mile. The only thing that would remain is whether Auctane’s engineering prowess, which is significant, can be redeployed into turning WWEX’s business into an organization that more resembles Cainiao or Amazon with a tech first culture, mindset, and management.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

1. So, what exactly is Auctane and who owns it?

Think of Auctane as the massive, quiet giant behind the shipping labels for millions of small e-commerce businesses. It’s not one single brand but a portfolio company owned by the private equity firm Thoma Bravo. Auctane itself owns a whole family of shipping software you’ve definitely heard of: ShipStation, Stamps.com, Endicia, ShippingEasy, ShipEngine, and Metapack, among others. Thoma Bravo took the company (then called Stamps.com) private in a $6.6 billion deal back in 2021, right at the peak of the SaaS valuation craze. Essentially, if you’re an online seller printing labels, there’s a good chance you’re an Auctane customer whether you know it or not.

2. And what about WWEX Group?

WWEX Group is the other side of the coin. While Auctane is a pure technology company, WWEX is a logistics operator. They are a massive third-party logistics (3PL) provider, one of the largest non-retail resellers of UPS services in the US. The group itself is a combination of Worldwide Express, GlobalTranz, and Unishippers. Their bread and butter isn’t small, DIY online sellers. Their customers are more scaled businesses that need high-touch account management, freight brokerage (like LTL and truckload), and customized shipping solutions. They move a ton of volume and have deep relationships with carriers.

3. What’s the real valuation of Auctane and this new merged company?

The headline number being thrown around is $12 billion for the combined entity. Here’s the napkin math: Thoma Bravo bought Auctane for about $6.6 billion. WWEX Group is being valued in this deal at roughly $5 to $6 billion. Add them together, and you get to that $12 billion figure. However, the real valuation is a much murkier question. Thoma Bravo likely overpaid for Auctane in 2021 and is now sitting on an asset that’s hard to flip for a profit in today’s market. This merger is a creative way to restructure, load the combined company with new debt (a fresh $5 billion loan), and create a new story for investors. The true enterprise value will depend entirely on whether this forced marriage actually creates any real synergies, which, as I argued, is highly questionable.

Side Note: I got challenged on LinkedIn by an ex-MetaPack employee saying that I didn’t know what I was talking about saying that Auctane doesn’t do Enterprise. He’s right. MetaPack is famously Enterprise, but they are the lone wolf in the pack, and desperately clinging onto an outdated legacy model that isn’t suited to the next generation buyer.

4. What does this merger really mean for the average ShipStation customer?

In the short term? Probably not much. Your ShipStation dashboard will look the same, and your discounted USPS rates won’t disappear overnight. But in the long term, the strategic fit is awkward. Auctane’s customers are small, hands-off, DIY shippers. WWEX’s customers are larger businesses that want managed services. The risk is that Thoma Bravo will try to force a clumsy integration, pushing expensive contract logistics and freight services onto small sellers who don’t need them, or trying to automate WWEX’s high-touch service model, potentially alienating their core customers. The key risk is a period of internal confusion and strategy shifts that could distract from innovation and customer service for both sides.

Last year I published my Ecom Logistics Predictions for 2025 on January 3 2025. Let’s see how I did.

1. TikTok US is divested: RIGHT!

Ok, so maybe it happened in January of 2026, but I’m going to take credit for my prediction which came true when TikTok’s US operations was sold to a consortium of investors which included tech giant Oracle, and other investors Silver Lake, and MGX.

2. Section 321 $800 De Minimis gets the axe: RIGHT!

What started out decades ago as a provision to avoid spending more money to collect duties than the US received ultimately led to overseas companies, namely Chinese cross border sellers like Shein and Temu importing as much as 4M shipments daily with no duties or taxes collected. The De Minimis was closed on August 29, 2025.

3. Temus kills a logistics company: WRONG!

I thought that at least 1 well known logistic company would go down citing that Temu’s payment terms did them in, and while several did go under this year, none of them cited Temu or payment term as the primary reason.

4. Gig delivery in vogue: RIGHT!

Last year gig delivery was just beginning to get popular with UniUni getting into the marketing and Amazon Shipping stepping up it’s marketing, but 2025 saw it go into full swing as we say more entrants like GoFo, SwiftX, SpeedX, ShipX, Sway, and more. With the Quick Commerce Wars coming to the US, we are now seeing food delivery players like Door Dash and Uber Eats competing as well. I’ll take credit for this one.

5. GLS is spun out of IDS: WRONG!

Didn’t happen. Will it happen one day? Maybe.

6. SHEIN officially becomes the largest apparel retailer in the world: RIGHT!

The numbers aren’t in, but it’s pretty certain that Shein, with nearly $60B in sales in 2025 became the largest apparel retailer in the world, surpassing Zara Inditex which possibly did over $40B in 2025.

7. US Ports Strike Again: WRONG!

What a difference a ton of tariffs make. With all the strikes in 2024, I thought it would continue into 2025, but we have seeminly figured it out. That’s great next.

8. DSV acquires Freightos or Flexport: WRONG!

Nope it didn’t happen. Both Freightos and Flexport remain independent and DSV remains without hope for a non-M&A driven future.

9. AI is everywhere: RIGHT!

10. India becomes the new China: WRONG!

C’mon India you’re better than this. When are we seeing the Temu or Shein or India hit the world stage?

Final Score 6/10

And the worst carrier of them all is Jiffy Express. Watch the video and you’ll understand.

Personally I think that this is just a fantastic business idea. Should carriers start offering this as a premium service to their customers?

For those of you wondering the original Jiffy Express skit debuted on Saturday Night Live (SNL) October 24, 1992. Cast:

Kevin Nealon...executive
Rob Schneider...spokesperson
Julia Sweeney...Mrs. Collier
Melanie Hutsell...secretary
Ian Maxtone-Graham...employee

Hopefully no relationship or inspiration from was taken from Jiffy Express Inc. in Canada, or does it? More on that later.

Why is this funny?

This skit is funny because it borders on the absurd. A carrier company who’s real service is selling late delivery management, or accountability for late despatch by the shipper.

The lengths at which they go in order to age the package is both clever and hilarious at the same time.

The expectation for couriers to “take the blame” subverts our expectation because we generally expect the courier to be sincerely apologetic or even ashamed of their service level, but in this case, the twist is that the courier totally expects to take the blame and is without remorse.

The Real Jiffy Express Inc.

There actually is a real carrier named Jiffy Express Inc., though they are a far cry from the “late delivery management” service portrayed in the skit. Based in Manitoba, Canada, Jiffy Express is a specialized flatbed and heavy haul trucking company that provides LTL (less-than-load) and FTL (full-truck-load) services across North America.

Checking out their website, they were founded on a commitment to safety and reliability, operates a fleet of over 100 trucks and 140 trailers, and focuses on industrial and commercial freight rather than small parcels.

So, while they share the name, you won’t be calling them to get a package delivered to your doorstep—unless that package is a piece of heavy machinery.

You can find them at their official website: https://jiffyexpress.ca

What: Deliver Middle East
Where: Hilton Dubai Al Habtoor City
When: 21-22 Jan 2026
Price: FREE for Brands & Retailers

Attendee Registration

For the 1st time ever, Deliver will host it’s inaugural Middle East conference in Dubai. This is a new conference anchored by Dubai’s very own DP World.

With an action packed agenda, which starts with a pre-event DP World site visit and VIP dinner on the 20th, it will be interesting to see how this conference unfolds, the feedback, and how it positions itself in the overall conference world.

The format of the conference follows it’s highly successful Deliver Europe conference where attendees who are buyers of logistics services are provided with free hotel and some transportation subsidies, primarily funded by exhibitors who can be LSPs or other ecosystem players.

Exhibitor wise, this looks to be an intimate affair - this is both good and bad for the exhibitors as it means the show is going to feel small and there will be far less large scale vendor-to-vendor networking that is one of the hallmarks of the Europe event, but it also means that exhibitors that did show up are really going to dominate the conversations with the attendees.

🔘 Headline Sponsor: DP World
🔘 The Parcel Carriers: Evri, K-Parcel, Jeebly
🔘 Software: Blue Yonder, Manhattan, Fluent Commerce
🔘 Fulfilment and Freight: Wayfindr, DSV, USC Express, DP World
🔘 Other: CMC Packaging, Taxually, Modern Expo, Nash

Millenials are the last great generation. Let me explain.

Addictive Mobile Apps

Millenials were the last generation to grow up without addictive mobile apps like social media and video games dominating their coming-of-age phase

Anyone who has read Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation knows what I’m talking about.

There was no such thing as escaping into your mobile phone at a boring family event, strangers house party, night out on the town, or at a corporate event.

Wanted to get a date? The majority of Millenials had no effective dating apps.

For many Millenials, if you wanted to make friends or find a date, you had to muster up the courage to talk to talk to total strangers.

In other words, the majority of Millenials developed social skills out of necessity.

Experience not Vertical Video

With AI turbocharging work and productivity, Millenials are the last generation to have done everything the old fashioned way to the point where their knowledge has been internalized - born of experience and forged into instinct.

These are the young professionals that mostly did math in their head, spent hours or days writing essays, researched topics without an LLM, and debugged their own code line by line.

Now, with AI decimating entry level jobs, Gen Alpha won’t even get a fair shake at the job market, and if they do, they will rarely have the opportunity to understand a company well enough to connect the dots at a level that the Millenial can.

Gen Z, you’re kind of in the game, but through no fault of your own, you’re overshadowed by your Millenial peers

But what about GenX? Over the hill, or still in the game?