DHL Group sees a growing number of its customers looking for alternative manufacturing locations in South-east Asia to as far away as Mexico and Turkey as companies look to reduce their reliance on China as a global production hub.  

“We really do see changes in the trade pattern,” DHL chief executive officer Tobias Meyer said in an interview with Bloomberg TV. “We see China+1, alternative locations to the focus on China as a manufacturing hub,” he said, referring to a push by Chinese manufacturers to establish at least one factory outside their home country.

The shifts in international trade patterns are likely to help logistics firms such as DHL as it follows its clients, using its network to connect the dots along global trade paths from its multiple cargo hubs around the world, including in Hong Kong.

Companies have been working for the last couples of years on ways to manage risks in their supply chains, whether in the wake of pandemic-related export disruptions or because of geopolitical tensions and trade curbs. US tariffs on a range of Chinese goods dating back to the Trump era, meanwhile, have pushed some businesses to shift their supply chains to places such as South-east Asia or Mexico.

“Many of our customers are looking for places in Asean, and also Mexico and Turkey to set up shop,” Meyer said, noting the flow of Chinese electric vehicle companies headed to Europe. “Those shifts are happening. And it is a new pattern for many manufacturing companies, and we do follow those manufacturing companies as their logistics service provider,” he said.

As US President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping prepare to meet later this week on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in San Francisco, Meyer said he hoped the world’s two biggest economies manage to cool geopolitical tensions.

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“We’ve seen quite some hurdles to trade rising over the last years. It will clearly be a positive signal if we get more into a normal mode again,” he said. BLOOMBERG