Thomas Nationwide Transport (TNT) and Acquisitions to Grow (Essay Sample)

Thomas Nationwide Transport (TNT)
Name
Institution
Thomas Nationwide Transport (TNT)
Introduction
TNT is a company involved in the delivery of parcels, freight and documents safely between businesses. The company makes use of road and air transport to carry out its business. The company was founded in the year 1946 by Ken Thomas. This is a company with quite humble beginnings. It had only a single truck as at the time of its establishment. In the year 1958, it became Thomas Nationwide Transport (TNT). It then changed to TNT Express Services UK in the year 1978. This company has since grown through leaps and bounds to become a global leader in its line of production. It boasts of a total of 10, 000 employees spread across 200 countries in which the company has outlets (Abeles, 2010).
Discussion
Through the use of mergers and acquisitions, TNT managed to move its operations from a national level to a global one. TNT was started in Australia in the year 1946, a few moments after the hostilities characterizing the Second World War. Its founder is an Australian by the name Ken Thomas. The company operated only in Australia up to the year 1967 when it merged with Alltrans. Alltrans was a company operating in New Zealand. It was started by a Hungarian immigrant named Peter Abeles in collaboration with a fellow Hungarian immigrant named George Rockey. After the merger, the resulting company was given the name TNT Ltd. This company enabled TNT to go global as it started its operations in two countries namely Australia and New Zealand. The company resulting from the merger of these two companies appointed Peter Abeles as its first managing director (Affleck, 2008).
The company soon expanded beyond the boundaries of the first two countries so that it spread to 180 counties by the 1980s. This so rapid expansion saw the company become the second largest transport empire in the world. It spread its operations to cover road, rail, sea and air transport. The expansion witnessed in the 1980s was basically motivated by a desire to capture the European market. TNT Ltd soon became the first transport company to purchase its own aircraft. This in turn led to the creation of the first Pan-European overnight service through the application of a dedicated fleet. TNT Ltd continued with its global expansion when it co-founded GD Express Worldwide in the year 1992. It co-founded this organization so that it owned 50% of the organization. The other 50% of the shares were owned by other two companies. These were the Dutch telecoms and postal company and the state-owned postal companies of Canada, France, West Germany and Sweden. These two companies formed a partnership named KPN. KPN went ahead to buy TNT in a rather friendly merger in the year 1996. This post and parcels focused union then decided to emerge from the telecoms business. This happened in the year 1998 and it is a move which saw the formation of TNT N.V (Tronrud, 2009).
TNT Express was demerged on the 26th of May in the year 2011 from its parent company; a move which saw it get listed on the Euronext Amsterdam Stock Exchange. This happened on the 19th of March in the year 2012. Following this, the company changed its name to PostNL. UPS announced its interest to own TNT Express in January 2013. This move was however rejected on competition grounds. This is because UPS had not acquired permission from the European Commission to do so. Through these changes therefore, TNT has been able to move its operations to the global arena. The company has used mergers and strategic acquisitions as key strategies to expand to the global arena. The company now operates road and air transportation networks across Europe, the Asia Pacific region, Africa, the Middle East and the Americas. The company has been trying rail freight with the intention of enhancing support to UK businesses. These targets to reduce carbon emissions hence deal with the issue of global warming (Base, 2005).
The transition of this company from national operations to global operations can be facilitated by a comprehensive change approach model. Value based logistics are key to this expansion to the global arena. These are logistics which require three fundamental elements. These are globalism, connectivity and service. Globalism refers to more than just carrying out operations in more than a single country. It means having the ability to give a preferred standard of service to any client no matter their location in the world. This can only happen if a company is involved in a global supply chain (Dawson, 2010). This would enable the company have efficient supply network across the globe without necessarily having its employees across all the countries it operates in. This requires the services of the right logistics solution provider. This is simply a partner who can correctly understand how things get done in every country where the company has customers. The logistics solution provider chosen must for instance have knowledge about issues such as customs clearance, regulations and taxes as well as business hours and holidays. The second requirement is connectivity. Having the correct connectivity to information and logistics gives the company a powerful global statistics formula. This connection has to be both physical and virtual. There is need for the company to get connected both physically and electronically to every business and home in all the target countries. This kind of connectivity is quite essential in the development of new supply chain solutions for any company operating globally (Burke, 2013).
A massive IT infrastructure is also essential. This is an infrastructure fed by data from numerous direct daily contacts with businesses and customers across the globe. Such an infrastructure would enable the company to become quite relevant and user friendly to millions of customers spread across the globe. Document exchange and internet tools would be helpful on this front. Forging electronic –commerce alliances with various companies ensures that the company’s shipping services have standard features in their software packages utilized in the creation of Internet based catalogs and business to business shopping malls (DeBruijn, 2011). The change approach model facilitating the effective implementation of the company’s transition from national to global business is also supported by its mission. TNT has a mission that targets to exceed the expectations of its customers as far as the transfer of their parcels around the globe is concerned. This is a statement showing the intention to operate globally. Moreover, the mission of the company targets to deliver value to its customers through the provision of highly reliable as well as efficient solutions through delivery networks. Further, the company has a mission which targets to lead the industry through inculcating pride in customers, creating value to stakeholders and sharing responsibility around the globe (Carnall, 2014).
The appropriate change agent who can facilitate this company to enter the global arena is an external agent as opposed to an internal one. This is because an external one is more likely to succeed as an internal one may be bound by company’s culture, politics and traditions. These factors clearly may not be the same as those in the other countries the company wishes to expand into. However, to avoid a situation whereby the external agent lacks sufficient knowledge on the internal procedures of the company, they would be paired with an internal coordinator picked from the human resource department of the company. These two would then work jointly with the company’s line management (Zairi, 2008).
The change agent in this case would be awarded a number of responsibilities. Firstly, the agent would act as a consultant. The agent would help members generate data from within the organization in order to discover the problems bedeviling the company. These problems are discovered once this generated data is analyzed. The second role of this agent would be that of training. This involves educating the members on the various ways they can use the analyzed data to effect the required change. Moreover, the training would involve assisting members to retrieve, translate and apply the new generated data to solve future problems. Moreover, the agent would be charged with the responsibility of research. As a researcher, the agent would be expected to train members of the company on the skills required for valid evaluation of the effectiveness of action plans put into action. Research would also help construct effective processes for dealing with future problems in the company (Carnall, 2014).
The successful change agent would be expected to possess a number of essential characteristics. Firstly, the agent would be expected to have homophily. This is because, research shows that the more similar the change agent and the employees of the organization are, the more likely it is that the change endeavors will succeed. This similarity ensures that the members accept the change and the agent easily understands the employees. The change agent is also expected to have the capacity to empathize. This would ensure that the change agent clearly comprehends the feelings of the members of the organization. This would ensure improved communication and cooperation. The third important trait is that of linkage. This refers to the extent of the bond between the change agent and the organization members. The stronger the bond, the higher the degree of cooperation hence the higher the chances are that the effort will be successful (Anderson, 2014).