DHL invests in St. Petersburg market

DHL officials revealed their development plans for the Northwest Region ofRussia at a press conference yesterday, as well as major plans forinvestment."During 2001, we doubled the volume of our turnover in the NorthwestRegion, in comparison with 2000, while sales volume in the parcel categoryshowed a 64-percent increase during the first six months of 2002, comparedto the same period in 2001," said Axel Gietz, corporate-affairs director ofDHL Worldwide Express. Alexander Danilov, country manager for DHL Russia,said that "By the end of 2002, we are planning to introduce a number of newclient services, including Time Definite Delivery and Deutsche Post Globalmail." "Our investments in the development of our business in Russia havereached $50 million, and we are going to invest 10 percent of our profiteach year," Gietz said.Analysts estimate that the air-express delivery market in Russia is worthabout $75 million per year, and that it is growing at an annual rate of 10percent to 12 percent. The air-express delivery market is for the most partcontrolled by foreign companies such as DHL, UPS, TNT, FedEx and EMS.According to research carried out by Research International, a researchagency, DHL's market share in Russia was 53 percent, the St. PetersburgTimes reported..