Fraport Cargo: Kreutel Goes, Conrady Comes

It’s the third change in personnel at the top deck of Fraport’s cargo unit within less than 12 months. Last October, former freight chief Dirk Schusdziara, who had taken on other influential tasks within the Fraport Group, was replaced by Felix Kreutel. Now Kreutel is next in line exiting freight, soon handing over responsibilities at one of Europe’s busiest cargo airports to Max Conrady.
This reminds one of a merry-go-round turning faster and faster.
When taking a second look, however, it shows that it was Kreutel who has built the airport’s freight division from scratch during the last five or so years.
But when it came to decide on the leading position in mid-2015, Fraport preferred nominating Schusdziara who at that time was placed above Kreutel in the internal hierarchy of the Fraport Group, presumably due to seniority.

Rough road ahead
Whatever the case, Conrady is facing a lot of tough challenges, pushing forward projects initiated by his two predecessors to bring the different initiatives started by Schusdziara and Kreutel to sustainable results.
Not really an enviable task since a number of forwarding agents and cargo airlines complain consistently about traffic jams happening at CargoCity South, handling problems and congested warehouses, leading to delays of shipments and a loss of reputation for the entire airport and its users.
“What’s urgently needed is a leading figure that puts the different and often fragmented pieces in air freight at FRA’s CargoCity South together, orchestrating activities such as customs clearance, ramp control, ground handling between airlines, forwarders, authorities, handling agents and cargo community members that are doing business in Frankfurt,” urges CEO Stephan Haltmayer of forwarding firm Quick Cargo Service.

Plain talking
Haltmayer is by no means a single voice but one of many demanding higher process efficiencies. How to better the operational processes is a hot topic standing on the agenda of the upcoming annual conference on air freight developments held at the House of Mobility and Logistics (HOLM) near Rhine-Main Airport from 30-31 August. Organizer of the event is the Air Cargo Community Frankfurt, a broad alliance including - among others – delegates of freight airlines, handling agents, scholars, integrators, Fraport Cargo, and IT providers.
The tight program includes – among more than a dozen other topics – the presentation of DHL’s latest “Trend Radar 4.0”, first-hand information on self-driving “Smart Air Cargo Trailers,” and preliminary results of IT provider Dakosy’s “Fair@Link” solution to equalize the traffic caused by trucks going to or coming from Frankfurt’s CargoCity South. As CargoForwarder Global was told beforehand, Dakosy’s data analysis provides encouraging findings.

Heiner Siegmund