"AEI old guard to take on heavyweights", Air Cargo Magazine, September 15, 2006

WHEN Giorgio Laccona gave up his job as chief executive officer of Savino del Bene USA, to join IJS Global as chairman and chief executive officer in July, the move seemed to confirm to many observers their suspicion that they were watching the emergence of a new version of Air Express International.

Like the old AEI, IJS has its headquarters in Connecticut. It also looks a lot like AEI in terms of senior management. Three quarters of the company's top executives used to work for the former airfreight powerhouse including Laccona who spent 24 years at AEI, rising to the post of senior vice-president for the Americas in 1999. Sjoerd Van Loon, another AEI veteran, is chief executive officer for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, while John Gallahan, also of former AEI fame, is the chief executive officer for the Asia-Pacific and Americas regions.

Laccona said the AEI connection was not by design but by default. The mega-mergers that have swept through the industry have freed up a lot of talented and experienced people “that are tired of the consolidation process and who feel they can do more in a small to medium-size company”.

IJS may be smaller than the industry heavyweights its senior managers worked for in the past, but it aims to be global in scale. Trading under the Inter-Jet Systems banner until 2005, it was acquired the year before by Connecticut based private equity fund Brynwood Partners as part of a strategy to build a presence in the freight forwarding industry. According to Laccona, the goal is to turn IJS into an outfit with annual revenues of around US$500 million and a global footprint, employing 1,200-1,500 people.

To date it has seven offices in the US and covers most of the Asia-Pacific region, (with offices in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Bangkok and Manila and agency partnerships in other markets).

Laccona intends to open branches in Dallas/Fort Worth and Chicago shortly, to complete the US network and eyes the major Canadian gateways for next year. “Now we concentrate on Europe and South America,” he said.

The expansion pace has been nothing short of blistering. When Van Loon came on board in early July, IJS opened up in Amsterdam and Dubai, and a Taiwan office followed at the end of the month. Laccona reckons that this momentum will carry on “for at least the better part of 2007. We expect to have the network in place in mid-07”, he said.

At the same time, the company is pushing to set up its IT infrastructure, which Laccona hopes to start early next year. Not surprisingly, the man recruited in August to develop and implement the global operating system is another old AEI hand.

“No question, the Far East will be the majority of our business,” Laccona said. He projected that the region will account for 60-65 per cent of IJS’s traffic, while North America will generate about 20 per cent. Still, he has no intention of moving his headquarters to the company locations in Hong Kong or Shanghai.

The predominant AEI background gives the IJS management the strongest experience in the air cargo sector, but Laccona is eager to build up a sizeable ocean business too.

Activities like warehousing and distribution are also on the cards, but not as a major focus. Like AEI or Panalpina, he views these areas as possible adjuncts to the core forwarding business.