Originally Posted by
Buck92
OK, I read Mullen's written testimony and concede that he did state "...susequently DHL was approached by UPS..." [the pdf file doesn't lend itself to cutting/pasting here and I'm too lazy to retype the whole thing], so I'll stand corrected on that.
I still think it's important to understand what came before "subsequently" in the above quote, which parapharsing, was that DHL was hemmoraging big money on the ASTAR/ABX arrangement, according to Mullen.
I guess my issue with the word "poaching" is that implies some kind of hostile takeover of DHL, or more specifically your flying -- as if DHL was sailing along just fine making a profit until along came evil UPS to scoop them up, which I don't think happened. Generally the way these deals go down is the company (DHL) lets it be known they are looking for ways to cut costs with air transpo and other vendors (UPS) come to them with their offer for service. I guess it's a chicken/egg argument, but are you saying that if it weren't for UPS approaching DHL, DHL would have never thought of getting someone else to do their flying?
That's correct Buck. When DPWN came out with the big plan, DHL was planning a refleet/and hopeful merger of Astar/ABX for the US operations. The DPWN announcement caught everyone (including DHL) off guard. As to the "poaching" thing, perhaps that was a bit harsh, however, it still stands that UPS approached DPWN with the idea, and thus DHL's reorganization plan was derailed. That's what you get when a micro-biologist is in charge of DPWN, I suppose.