Navia and TCI International formalise joint venture

TWO of the Sino-Australian and Sino-American freight market's most established independent operators have formalised a decade-long partnership, launching TCI Navia; a joint venture combining Navia's technology-led freight platform with TCI International's China-wide operational network.

The new joint venture is to cover a team of more than 100 staff across Shanghai, Shenzhen, Ningbo, Xiamen and Hong Kong and provide ocean freight, air freight, third-party logistics and customs brokerage services.

The two businesses have had a relationship for more than a decade, with their partnership progressing during the last five years.

This, together with Navia's proprietary technology, which allows customers to track items at the SKU level, aims to provide real-time KPI reporting and a command-layer system that highlights exceptions early in the supply chain, is said to have made the joint venture an obvious next move.

TCI Navia China represents the first step in Navia's global expansion strategy, with the Group targeting a wider footprint through other joint ventures or office openings across key trade markets in the medium and long term.

Navia Group chief executive Simon Borg said Navia was “an emerging global player, and on paper we have the volumes to stand up our own China operation”.

“But the reality is that TCI China has been handling our freight for years, and the philosophies of our two businesses are remarkably aligned: the same obsession with customer care, the same flat structure, the same willingness to solve the hard problems rather than pass them on.

“Going it alone would have meant rebuilding something we already have,” he said.

“Formalising the partnership lets us spin up a team at scale on day one, with people we've trusted for the better part of a decade, and the transition is seamless for our customers because nothing about the service they already rely on changes, it just gets better."

TCI China managing director Ricky Shon said they had worked with the team at Navia for a long time now and enjoyed a strong working relationship.

“Our customers really love the NaviaHub platform, and the teams of both companies are true experts. When you're already working with good people, it makes sense to combine forces rather than go it alone,” Mr Shon said.

Mr Borg said the larges shift for customers was that their entire supply chain, origin through destination, now sat on one platform.

“NaviaHub already gives our customers SKU-level visibility, live KPI reporting and exception management at the destination end; through the JV, that same visibility now extends right back into the China origin leg, where historically there's been the least transparency in the industry,” he said.

“Onboarding is measured in days, not months, because we integrate directly with customers' ERPs via API. And because it's one ecosystem, not two vendors stitched together, customers get a single team accountable for the full lifecycle of their freight."

Mr Shon said customers were already benefitting from the partnership.

He said TCI Navia would morph from two strong mid-market players into an enterprise entity “capable of taking on the freight conglomerates of the world”.

Shifting trade patterns

The joint venture has also been hailed as a strong move in a time of geopolitical tensions and shifting trade patterns.

"Trade patterns are shifting faster than most supply chains can adapt — tariffs move, routes close, sourcing bases relocate, and customers are increasingly asked to make commercial decisions with incomplete information,” Mr Borg said.

“By bringing our two ecosystems onto one platform, we give customers full lifecycle visibility over every shipment, purchase order to final mile, and that visibility is the raw material for good decisions in a volatile environment.

“Shared intelligence across Navia's network in Australia, the US, Malaysia and New Zealand and TCI's footprint across China and the Far East means we can see disruption earlier, reroute faster, and give customers the data they need to make their own strategic calls.”

Mr Shon said as a joint business, the collaboration was “significantly amplified”.

“The result means that our shared intelligence, expertise and technology provide a more powerful and equipped engine to help our customers navigate the disruption and uncertainty of the current world of trade,” he said.