South Korea’s Lotte Global Logistics, a major
Seoul-headquartered logistics and shipping firm, has joined the
Blockchain in Transport Alliance (BiTA), FreightWaves reported Monday, July 9.
The BiTA trade association was formed in 2017 to popularize and
develop blockchain applications in the
transport and logistics industries, as well as to establish
industry standards for adoption of the technology. The alliance
uses OriginTrail, a
purpose-built protocol for supply chains based on blockchain, and
counts around 400 participants as members.
Lotte Global, for its part, is a full-service logistics
provider, overseeing warehouse management, intermodal import/export
terminals and customs clearance, parcel delivery, and moving
freight by air, rail, and truckload. According to the company site,
its transportation resources for parcel delivery form “the largest
network in [South] Korea.”
Lotte’s Korean delivery services are reportedly structured
around 15 mega terminals, 90 branch offices and over a thousand
local offices, with further overseas logistics points across the
Americas, Asia and Europe.
FreightWaves notes that in advance of its interest in blockchain
technology, Lotte Global has already been offering a smartphone
application for its services, as well as conducting research into
drone-operated delivery services.
BiTA’s managing director, Craig Fuller, said the alliance was
“excited” to benefit from Lotte Global’s veteran experience in
“many segments of the supply chain,” which will help the
organization in its ambitions to develop blockchain data standards
that are “truly end-to-end.”
To date, BiTA has been joined by major industry players such as
FedEx, Uber, shipping giant UPS, and GE Transportation, a global
supplier of railroad, mining, marine, drilling, and energy
generation equipment. In May, Cointelegraph reported on the affiliation of
yet another transport industry giant, the U.S.’s Norfolk Southern Corp.
Also in May, the Korean Customs Service (KSC) signed an MoU with the Korean
operator of Malltail - the leading consumer parcel forwarding
service in the country - to develop a “full-scale” blockchain-based
customs platform for the e-commerce industry.