Maersk Makes More LatAm Investments Amid Nearshoring Boom
As nearshoring in Central America and South America keeps gaining traction, a freight and transportation giant is marking more territory across the regions.
Maersk is strengthening its presence in Latin America with the opening of a 150,700-square-foot fulfillment center in Colombia and a 37,700-square-foot fulfillment center in Panama.
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The new Maersk fulfillment center in Colombia is already serving customers from the consumer products and pharmaceutical industries. The warehouse is located in the Zol Funza logistics development, which is a 50 minute-drive from six of the main consumer market areas in Bogota.
The center provides a warehouse management system, cross-docking capabilities and other value-added services, and includes lithium battery electrical equipment and LED lighting.
Maersk, like other logistics titans, is seeing plenty of incentive to move further down south as apparel companies shift production closer to home.
In 2023, brands like Target and Columbia Sportswear have made massive commitments to Latin American sourcing, with Target saying it would increase its spending by $300 million in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras by the end of 2023. The mass merchant also plans to deepen existing relationships with vendors in all three countries. Columbia Sportswear has committed to purchase up to $200 million in products from northern Central America.
“Central America has been less attractive as a nearshoring option for U.S. companies than Mexico, most notably due to lacking investment in the business landscape. However, that is gradually changing, and it is becoming increasingly recognized as a strategic nearshoring opportunity due to geographic proximity, free trade agreements, low operational costs and large workforces,” Jena Santoro, senior manager of supply chain risk at Everstream Analytics, told Sourcing Journal. “Further, the region has well-connected logistics infrastructure like ports and highways, ensuring ease of transportation to and from U.S. markets.”
Maersk’s Colombia investment will cost a pretty penny at more than $200 million, says Antonio Dominguez, head of Latin America and the Caribbean at Maersk.
In a statement, Dominguez said the capital allocation would expand Maersk’s logistics infrastructure with investments in cold storages, warehouses, depots, distribution centers and container yards, aiming to provide support to customers’ supply chains while responding to their industries’ requirements.
“Through this expansion to our offering, we strengthen our position as a logistic integrator in the region, connecting the needs of the sector with the needs of the world while keeping our focus on offering high value-added solutions to our customers,” Dominguez said.
Maersk’s Panama facility, the company’s second in the country, opened in August. Located in the Panama Pacifico logistics park, the 37,700-square-foot site is strategically located approximately 18 miles from the capital, Panama City, and has direct access to the main highways, ports, and airports.
These new facilities take Maersk’s total footprint in the area to more than 1.94 million square feet spread across eight facilities in Central America, the Caribbean, Colombia and Peru.
The company already opened a new warehouse in Peru earlier this year, as well as three facilities in Chile near Santiago. The sites strengthen the logistics giant’s existing capabilities in the country, including the San Antonio Logistics Center in Valparaiso, with over 750,000 square feet of warehousing space located just 10 miles from Chile’s main port.
As Maersk moves further into Latin American countries, DHL is emphasizing nearshoring—or what it calls “omni-sourcing”—capabilities in the region, investing $556 million in Latin American operations through 2028. The growth in nearshoring also likely had a hand in the initial public offering (IPO) of LatAm Logistic Properties, an industrial logistics real estate developer that was valued at $578 million.
“Sectors like textile and apparel manufacturing stand to benefit immensely from this expansion as concerns over the use of forced Uyghur labor in China’s Xinjiang cotton-producing region brought to line unethical sourcing links for many large apparel firms,” Santoro said. “Global fashion vendor Hansae Co. Ltd. has led the charge with this shift, making large-scale investments in Central America by opening 10 new manufacturing sites in Guatemala and Nicaragua.”
With the new investments, Maersk aims to better connect Latin America with the world by expanding its end-to-end warehouse and distribution footprint through rail, air and its regional consolidation/de-consolidation network.
As a global leader in logistics services and the world’s second-largest container shipping firm by volume transported, the company operates in more than 130 countries and employs over 100,000 people. Maersk is aiming to reach net-zero emissions by 2040 across the entire business with new technologies, new vessels and green fuels.
