Kuehne+Nagel Enters Into Long-Term Collaboration With Amazon

(Bloomberg) — Swiss freight transportation group Kuehne+Nagel International AG has entered a long-term strategic collaboration with Amazon.com Inc., less than a month after its majority owner died.

Kuehne+Nagel said the collaboration is designed to strengthen customer services for Amazon and includes Amazon Web Services. That will strengthen supply-chain resilience and efficiency, the Swiss company said in a statement on Monday. Kuehne+Nagel shares rose as much as 5.2%, the most since March.

The collaboration is supported by a call option on existing Kuehne+Nagel shares that settles in cash or, at Amazon’s election, in shares, with vesting based on commercial milestones and services over a period of up to seven years. A third party financial institution will engage in hedging transactions in Kuehne+Nagel shares to support this arrangement, the Swiss firm said.

“We are setting the foundation for a new level of customer service commitment at a global scale for Amazon,” Kuehne+Nagel Chief Executive Officer Stefan Paul said in the statement.

The collaboration with Amazon comes after German shipping tycoon Klaus-Michael Kuehne, who expanded the Kuehne+Nagel into one of the world’s biggest sea and air freight forwarders, died last month. As a third-generation majority owner of the company, which was founded by his grandfather, Kuehne broadened its global reach through acquisitions, expanding into a global transport behemoth with a staff of 88,000.

Data Center Boom

The deal highlights Kuehne+Nagel’s “strong and growing” position in the profitable data center infrastructure logistics market, according to Vontobel analyst Michael Foeth. He has a buy-rating on the stock.

Kuehne + Nagel is seen as a bellwether for the global economy. The company boosted its recurring Ebit guidance for the year in July following strong results in its air and sea logistics businesses.

In the past decade, Amazon has built its own freight and delivery operation, reducing its reliance on partners that couldn’t keep pace with the Seattle-based company’s growth. In May, it announced Amazon Supply Chain Services, packaging its existing air and ocean freight, trucking and last-mile delivery services into a new offering.

(Updates with analyst comment, some background)

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