DHL CARE Award recognizes air cargo carrier excellence
Logistics and shipping provider DHL recognized the performance of four major air cargo carriers with the first DHL Carrier Award for Reliability and Excellence, DHL CARE Award, which sets a new industry standard for reliability and quality for air-freight transport of temperature-sensitive life sciences products.
First recipients of the new award were American Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Swiss International Air Lines, and United Cargo. The award was presented at the 16th DHL Global Life Sciences & Healthcare Conference in Miami FL recently, which brought together pharmaceutical and medical devices manufacturers to discuss industry logistics and supply chain trends.
“It is essential that life sciences products remain in strictly controlled conditions during transportation from pharmaceutical manufacturers to hospitals, medical centers, warehouses, and ultimately to doctors and patients around the world,” said Angelos P Orfanos, president, Life Sciences & Healthcare Sector, DHL Customer Solutions & Innovation. “The new DHL CARE Award is designed to encourage and recognize air carrier excellence as they put forth great efforts into delivering unrivalled temperature-controlled transportation services for the life sciences sector.”
The four airlines that received the DHL CARE Award achieved the highest ranking out of a pool of 15 carriers evaluated in terms of performance, attention to quality, and innovative leadership. This ranking included such performance and excellence indicators as shipment temperature consistency, effective communication, process compliance, airport hub assessments, and near-real-time data sharing.
David Bang, global head of DHL Temperature Management Solutions/CEO LifeConEx at DHL Global Forwarding, said during the award ceremony that DHL is responsible for the safe transportation of pharmaceutical goods and equipment around the world. It is essential for DHL Global Forwarding to establish, maintain, and monitor shipment quality standards at every transportation and storage stage of the end-to-end supply chain.
“By working together with the airline carriers, DHL ensures in-transit pharmaceutical product integrity,” he said. “We are doing more than raising quality management standards; we are also supporting pharmaceutical manufacturers and medical institutions in their efforts to support everyday life.”
DHL serves customers globally via a network for air and ocean freight that spans more than 150 nations. More than 90 life sciences-certified stations support the DHL Air Thermonet network and hubs in Panama, Istanbul, Dubai, and Singapore.