Spotlight pacity is the reason given for greater reliance by shippers on in-house assets, and it is being enabled by technology.“ The importance of the private fleet has become more elevated as shippers take greater control of supply chains,” especially since the COVID-19 pandemic, said Tom Moore, NPTC’ s executive vice president. The change has been noted by industry analysts and forhire carriers. Schneider National, a major truckload carrier and provider of dedicated fleet services, has seen the growth of private, shipper-owned fleets outpace the for-hire carrier market, Mark Rourke, CEO and president, told a Morgan Stanley investor conference Sept. 11.“ For a number of years, we’ ve kind of assessed the full truckload market to be about 50 % for-hire, 50 % private fleet,” Rourke said at the event. Coming out of COVID-19,“ there’ s been a shift” to 55 % private fleet, 45 % for-hire, Rourke said.“ That’ s a pretty big movement,” he said, although he thinks there are opportunities“ to move the needle back toward 50-50” as truck fleet operating costs rise.

Vietnam air cargo taking off

Air cargo carriers are swamping the skies with capacity from Vietnam to the US and Europe to handle

Airlines boosting trans-Pacific air freight capacity

Air freight capacity from Asia Pacific to North America, with weekly change

Capacity tonne

120,000

100,000

20,000

Source: Rotate

steadily rising demand for highvalue products as electronics manufacturing shifts away from tariff-hit China. The huge demand on Vietnam’ s export routes, particularly on the trans-Pacific, can be measured via the amount of air freight capacity deployed since the US tariffs on China were imposed in April. Data from air cargo analyst Rotate shows capacity deployed on Vietnam-US routes increased by 95 % year over year in August to 2,400 metric tons. The capacity increase in the previous four months was even greater compared with last year

Capacity tonnes Weekly % change

60 %

40 %

-40 %

-60 %

as air cargo carriers injected freighters into Vietnam routes that were previously served indirectly. Rotate analyst Tim van Leeuwen said although most Vietnam trade was still carried indirectly via China, Hong Kong or other Asian hubs, the steep increase in direct capacity was a solid indicator of growth in the market. Capacity growth on Vietnam-Europe routes served mostly via the Middle East was pedestrian by comparison, rising 39 % in August, 55 % in July, 40 % in June, 44 % in May and increasing by 16 % in April, according to Rotate. Kathy Liu, vice president of global sales and marketing at Taiwanbased Dimerco Express Group, said manufacturers diversifying their China operations over the past year in anticipation of US tariffs under President Donald Trump are now starting to produce finished goods for the US and European markets.

Weekly % change

© 2025 S & P Global

GROUP SUBSCRIPTIONS

Provide unlimited access to JOC. com through individual logins and easily scale your group based on the number of desired users.

84403 Shutterstock. com

www. joc. com October 6, 2025 | Journal of Commerce 7