Speaker Spotlight: Arne Jeroschewski, Parcel Perform

Ahead of the World Mail & Express Asia (WMX Asia) Conference in Hong Kong, we caught up with Arne Jeroschewski, Founder & CEO at Parcel Perform. Arne will be speaking at WMX Asia 2019 and offers his thoughts on the conference and the future of the industry.

WMX – Tell us a little bit about yourself and your company.

AJ – I’m Arne Jeroschewski, Founder & CEO of Parcel Perform. Parcel Perform is the leading carrier-independent SaaS parcel tracking platform. We have over 600 carriers integrated on our platform, allowing our customers from anywhere around the world to integrate multiple logistics carriers into one standardized, intuitive platform. With logistics data aggregated and standardized, our customers are able to send proactive delivery updates and notifications to enhance the post-purchase customer experience, respond faster in their customer service calls and gain better visibility of their carriers’ performance.

As the CEO, I take care of the overall business strategy, growth and vision of the company. As a global platform, we are now aggressively expanding our geographical reach to service our customers across Asia Pacific, US and Europe. We’re also driving product innovation, leveraging machine learning to add delivery trends and prediction capabilities for our customers.

Prior to establishing Parcel Perform, I worked in several e-commerce and logistics roles in Europe and Asia – at DHL eCommerce (VP, Business Development); Singapore Post (General Manager of vPost and B2C e-commerce), Zalora Southeast Asia (CEO and Co-Founder), as well as several years in McKinsey consulting businesses in the high-tech and telecommunications industry.

I’m based in Singapore and have been living here for the past 7 years together with my wife and two children.

WMX – What will you be speaking about at WMX Asia this year?

AJ – I’m a huge believer in making data-driven decisions and I believe there will be huge improvements to be seen over the next few years as we explore even more use cases for logistics data. I’ll be speaking about how data, specifically parcel tracking data, will reshape the logistics and e-commerce industry and how businesses can start taking advantage of the potential that data offers. The possibilities of parcel tracking data are massive – today, we are seeing how it improves customer service efficiency and reduces costs related to logistics management and customer experience and by learning the trends around these data, we are opening up even more possibilities.

WMX – What do you hope our delegates will take away from your presentation?

AJ – I hope they will start thinking about using all the logistics data they already have! The proliferation of data might seem daunting, but businesses can get started by simply reviewing the data they already have, understanding where and how they store their logistics data and work with a solutions provider like Parcel Perform to help them make sense of all their data quickly and very intuitively.

WMX – How has the post and parcel industry changed in the past 5 years? What do you predict will happen in the next 5 to 10 years?

AJ – The e-commerce industry today is still in its early stages of development, but it already has changed massively since 2012 when I first started Zalora in Southeast Asia and it will still continue to change over the next couple of years. Over the last decade, the e-commerce buying experience for consumers was still not great – websites were not optimized for e-commerce, online payments were not secure and there was very little trust from consumers.

Today, the buying experience has improved drastically and the focus has now shifted to the delivery and post-checkout experience. E-Commerce merchants are now focusing on building longer customer lifecycles, higher customer loyalty, and engagement. Parcel Perform is focused on the post-purchase experience, helping merchants build a better post-checkout experience, better customer service around parcel delivery, and optimize their logistics.

In the next 5-10 years, this trend will only continue to develop. Consumers will desire flexibility and convenience, and retailers will need to adapt accordingly by continuously optimizing their processes, keeping up with customer experience, delivery trends and thinking ahead to stay competitive.

WMX – What is the biggest challenge in the post and parcel industry at the moment?

AJ – There needs to be a better way to manage logistics within the industry, especially in the last mile delivery process. Last-mile costs are usually around 30-50% of the entire logistics cost for e-commerce players. Not only is it inefficient, but it is also contributing towards urban issues in cities, e.g. traffic congestion, carbon emissions, etc, – and it is a process that does not focus on the end consumer’s experience.

Furthermore, logistics players are imposing a high complexity on their customers with every player requiring them to work with them under their terms – from the technical integration, to how you prepare and hand over shipments. If you work with many logistics service providers, this is a huge cost to anyone needing last-mile logistics services. We at Parcel Perform want to create a product that makes this process a lot easier for everyone involved.

WMX – What are the most critical changes that we must make to face the future effectively?

AJ – Logistics platforms and software need to optimize collaboration across the entire e-commerce logistics ecosystem. The entire ecosystem is driven to work together with the rise of innovation, technology and the need for speed.

That’s why we chose to make our platform carrier-agnostic and chose to onboard as many carriers as possible globally – to support the ecosystem and make it easier for our customers to operate. With multiple carriers integrated on our website, our customers are now able to track, analyze and optimize their logistics processes for all their operations around the world, in one platform.

Gone are the days of outdated software, hosted on outdated hardware in warehouses around the world. The future will be a network of interconnected cloud applications of logistics providers that are focused on delivering the most cost-effective logistics solution with the best experience to customers worldwide. Parcel Perform will be driving this transition in the future.

WMX – What is the most interesting trend for 2019?

AJ – I’m particularly excited about the growing sophistication in the Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence area. At Parcel Perform we are in a unique position as we have a wealth of parcel tracking data and I’m super excited about what we can do with the data to analyze and predict trends in logistics and e-commerce. Logistics has so much to gain from using these data to improve the efficiency of the supply chain as well as improve the experience of everyone involved. We see this as one of the most important value propositions that we are building at Parcel Perform.

WMX – What challenges do you foresee for the logistics industry given the rapid urbanisation of large parts of Asia?

AJ – As Asia rapidly urbanizes, major urban cities may find their infrastructure being stretched. Traffic congestion is frequently reported to be a pressing issue for cities. The growth of e-commerce and the resulting increase in transportation and delivery needs is one of the major contributors to traffic congestion. At the same time, delivery speeds are heavily affected by traffic congestion. A recent survey we conducted across Southeast Asia found that over 90% of customer complaints towards logistics companies are tied to parcel transit time and late delivery.

Therefore, the logistics industry will need to find ways to balance rapid urbanization in Asia while keeping the customer delivery experience a priority.
We are at the next evolution point where there would be many more options on where parcels can be picked up to enhance the post-purchase customer experience; lockers, delivery points, re-scheduling, re-directing to a neighbour or friend. With intelligence from logistics data, both carriers and retailers will find it easier to manage their logistics processes. More importantly, all these efforts will add a lot of convenience for consumers.

Arne will be speaking at the World Mail & Express Asia Conference 2019. WMX Asia is taking place at the Mira Hong Kong (15 – 17 September 2019). Visit www.wmxasia.com for more information.

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