"We believe that Singapore is the best place from which to grow our business and we are committed to developing Singapore as a regional hub," regional vice-president Ken McCall said. "With specialist staff in various areas moving to the existing office in Singapore, customers will have a one-stop shop for all their Asian distribution needs at a single point of contact."
The company believes that a streamlined, simplified structure will also be more attractive, and help it tie in with those who have their regional bases in Singapore.
In other news, TNT has been appointed by the South Korean Unification Board as the exclusive express forwarder for packages destined for North Korea's nuclear reactor construction site in Sinpo.
"We will soon transport commodities and office supplies to North Korea," TNT Express' Seoul-based president, Kim Roe-sung, said.
The commodities are for employees of South Korea's Korea Electric Power Corp, and Hyundai Engineering and Construction currently working at the nuclear reactor site. The board is the only authority in South Korea that has the jurisdiction to approve South Korean companies doing business in North Korea.
TNT was chosen due to its status as the first foreign forwarder in Pyongyang, with a branch office established in 1992. The North-South Korean political climate has left TNT's Pyongyang office mostly idle, Kim said.
The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation, a US-South Korea venture formed to build two light water nuclear reactors, offered TNT the contract. TNT will fly Seoul-Hong Kong-Beijing, where it will link up with North Korea's Koryo Airline for the latter's twice-weekly flight to Pyongyang.
From Pyongyang, the cargo will be delivered via rail to Sinpo by TNT's North Korean staff.
Amsterdam-based TNT first started serving the South Korean market in 1983 and now commands 15 per cent of the country's document delivery market.