Invest KOREA

From Point A to Point B
SDV Korea meets the growing transportation needs of its foreign and domestic customers

SDV Korea meets the growing transportation needs of its foreign and domestic customers

If you’re a foreigner living in Korea, you’ve probably noticed that you can get just about anything here that you can back home. And that’s largely because of companies like SDV Korea.

The imported medicine you bought in Korea? It probably got here through SDV Korea’s specialized healthcare airfreight service. The foie gras and cheese you eat here? They probably arrived in a temperature-controlled manner through SDV Korea. The brand-name bag you bought at the department store downtown? It likely passed through an inspection at one of SDV Korea’s three warehouses.

The main logistics subsidiary of the French Bollore Group since 1986, SDV offers international transport, customs brokerage, warehousing and distribution, supply chain management and other services. Back in the 60s and 70s, as many of its European customers, mostly French companies specializing in telecommunications, electrical equipment and power plants, started expanding into Asia, SDV opened offices in the region to provide them with transportation services.

SDV Korea was established in 1988, but under the previous names of SCAC and TTA. Today it offers services in multimodal transport, customs and regulatory compliance, logistics and industrial projects as well as supply chain services. It specializes in industries including automotive, healthcare, aerospace, industrial projects, oil & gas, luxury goods & cosmetics and food & beverage.

The majority of SDV Korea’s business deals with international freight transport, with the remainder being taken up by warehousing, largely for luxury goods & cosmetics.

“Basically, to make it simple for the ones who do not know anything about our industry, freight forwarding is like a travel agency, but for cargo,” said Thibault Janssens, Managing Director of SDV Korea. “It’s often on a door-to-door basis. It is by air or by sea and it can be inbound or outbound.”

With warehouses in Incheon, Pyeong-taek and Busan, SDV Korea provides storage and domestic distribution services. Half of the company’s deliveries business is for B2B. The other half involves SDV Korea delivering directly to the customer, to houses and apartments nationwide. The company is looking to expand its logistics warehousing services in the near future.

Korea’s many free trade zones are a great selling point for customers, who want to use Korea as a sub-regional hub as well as an assembly hub, Janssens said.

SDV Korea ranks about 6th for business volume among SDV’s Asia-Pacific locations and has experienced 10-15 percent annual growth in recent years. The SDV group has more than 500 offices and 35,700 employees worldwide.

SDV Korea’s staff includes specialists in the automotive, healthcare, oil & gas, food & beverage and luxury goods industries. Customers want to work with people who understand their industry and requirements, said Janssens

“You don’t handle medicines the same way you handle other kinds of items,” he said.

The Managing Director added that his company expects further significant development in healthcare, as Korean President Park Geun-hye has designated the industry one of the country’s main economic drivers for the next few years.

Korea’s investment in its world-leading shipbuilding industry makes oil & gas a major area for SDV Korea as well.

The company’s focus has shifted in recent years. While in the past it worked mostly to help its European customers develop their activities in Asia, now the company also supports Korean companies that want to expand internationally. Many of Korea’s conglomerates have already established themselves in developed markets and are looking at newer markets, like Africa. Add to that a greater tendency now to work with foreign partners than in the past, and the result is more opportunities for SDV Korea.

“They are all going for international development, so they understand now that there should be a little bit more of a foreign touch,” said Janssens. “We expect in the next coming years to have further big developments with the Korean chaebols.”

Of course, when it comes to doing business in Korea, it’s all about having that local touch. As the head of a company that has grown in Korea for more than 25 years, Janssens said the key to success for a foreign investor is to be “glocal,” but really, “to do it the Korean way.” While in Europe, a customer with a problem late at night would probably wait until morning to contact his supplier, customers in Korea would expect to be able to reach someone anytime, at 11 p.m., for example, he said.

“So this is one of many other things that makes Korea special,” added Janssens. “This is the first surprising part when you arrive here, but which is good because it forces you to bring the organization to a higher level.”

By Chang Young