| DVZ, 12. April 2007 |  |
Combining their Strengths
Good Take-off for Raben & Liesenfeld in Poland
Ewald Raben and Bodo Liesenfeld had been convinced rapidly about the feasibility of their idea. “It only took us two meetings and two phone calls to come to an agreement”, reports Bodo Liesenfeld, CEO of Rohde & Liesenfeld (R&L), ocean- and air freight forwarding company. The idea was turned into reality quickly with the foundation of the Raben & Liesenfeld joint venture on 1 February 2007.
The original idea had been as simple as comprehensible: The two firms combine their strengths, i.e. Raben group’s power on the Eastern European logistics market with R&L’s capability and international network in regard to ocean and airfreight. Meanwhile, the joint venture has three locations in Poland: at Raben’s headquarters in Pruszków near Warsaw, in Gadki near Poznán and in Krakow. Eleven employees look after the requests of Raben’s clients, who before had to have their ocean and air freight consignments handled by other logistics service providers.
“Many of our clients would have liked to co-operate with us in this service segment, however we neither disposed of the respective know-how nor network”, the Raben head explains his motivation to enter into a co-operation with R&L.
For Mr Liesenfeld the special attractiveness resides in the fact of being able to open up a new and prospering market for R&L: “Apart from the fact that Raben provides the market competence we had lacked, it is one of the leading providers of overland logistics in Poland with a huge clientele.” Therefore, the joint venture disposes of “a potential of growing far above average”.
Dutch Raben Group is one of the leading overland logistics providers in Poland with a staff complement of 2,600 in 18 locations. The international network of “The Global Alliance” (Geodis and Rohde & Liesenfeld) comprises 128 locations.
DVZ, 12.4.2007
