Kühne+Nagel has opened a new technology center in Chennai, India. The group wants to develop its own digital logistics products there and scale existing solutions faster.
Chennai is particularly attractive to Kühne+Nagel because of the large pool of software and engineering professionals. The company explicitly mentions applications around artificial intelligence.
For the freight forwarding industry, this is a good example of how large logistics providers are changing. Previously, their own strengths lay primarily in network, procurement, and operational execution. Today, software, data, and automation are increasingly becoming competitive advantages.
This does not mean that the freight forwarder becomes a software company. However, customers increasingly expect real-time data, automatic interfaces, and rapid analytics.
For smaller freight forwarding companies, the development is still relevant. They do not need to program everything themselves, but should understand which processes can be automated and where quality data is lacking.
With the new location, Kühne+Nagel demonstrates that technology is no longer just a supporting department, but rather a separate production factor.