Flexport’s Acquisition of an Amazon Exec 🚢

Flying into JFK the other day, I was reminded of the ongoing supply chain crisis in our seaports and on our shelves. The coastline was spotted with cargo ships, some full and some empty, waiting to access the New York and New Jersey ports. Heck, even our sriracha supply isn’t safe from these problems. But the NY/NJ port system has been successfully gaining ground in shipment volume by working with logistics managers who are avoiding bottlenecks on the West Coast.

Still, we are not immune from seeing similar bottlenecks as other ports, causing delays, coastline traffic, and increasing prices on consumer goods. It turns out that the empty cargo ships I saw dotting the coast line were stuck waiting for shipping containers to be emptied amidst continuing labor disruption in the trucking industry. The NY/NJ port system is doing what it can by freeing up space to store empty containers and trying to work with technologists to shore up the existing systems.

Cue the supply chain nerds.
Flexport has been trying to make sense of handwritten customs orders and the rise of e-commerce shopping since 2013. The company has recently reached an $8BN valuation for its supply chain management software and technology solutions and also recently announced it is passing the CEO torch to Amazon exec Dave Clark to bring the company to the next level with increased efficiency in shipments and a greater emphasis on automation. Presumably, he’ll also do his part to avoid “container loss,” the surprisingly common incidence of entire containers burning up, getting stolen, or simply falling into the ocean.

Clark is clearly qualified. Here is a glowing review from a recent Fortune feature: as “an Amazon employee since 1999, Clark built out the company’s multi-billion-dollar global operations, with a workforce of more than one million and a global logistics network including many thousands of planes, robots, trucks, and warehouses.”

Learn more about current CEO Ryan Peterson’s trajectory as a modern-day shipping magnate here.