Fedex

Executive Summary

Courier services, classified under services sector by United Nations Civilian Police Corps (UNCPC), is described as multiple operations consisting of pickup, transport and delivery services of documents, letters, parcels and packages either inland and/or overseas using one or more modes of transport and other courier services for goods transfer without storage, like freight services. (WTO,2005)

While postal and courier services depend upon physical means of delivery via air or surface or sea transport services, surface transport is the primary mode of transport used for delivery of parcels and other items within contiguous geographic regions of a country or countries depending on the distance involved. Otherwise air transport is used with hub operations. However such surface, air and sea transport services are classified in their own group under services. Sea freight is very rarely used by courier services as "speed of delivery" is a prime factor for this sector.(WTO,2005)

This paper is about one of the largest courier services known as Federal Express, Fedex in short, based on the philosophy of speedy delivery. Fedex began its operations in 1971 with a focus on 1 to 2 day delivery system using air-freight methods across the United States. Even though it catered to 25 cities within the country on the first day, it grew up to own a fleet of aircraft in 1977 and was listed in NYSE in 1978. Year 1979 saw Fedex computerising its1operations to manage people, packages, transport under different weather scenarios, etc., in real time. In 1984 it established operations in Asia Pacific leading to around the world flights in 2005 with more than $1 billion revenue in the process.(Fedex,2005)

Today with the expansion of its hub operations for air delivery and truck operations for surface delivery and an online tracking system that is user friendly, shippers will be able track