The logistics service provider as financial service provider

Outsourcing of logistics operations is, nowadays, a common practiceamong companies. The concept of Supply Chain Management has greatly evolved to the point of exploiting the significant competitive advantage of companies which core business is logistics services. However, the last 5 to 10 years have modelled a new economic and financial landscape that, through a reduction of access to finance and liquidity, has created stress on companies and consequent pressure towards working capital reduction.

Among other outcomes, this has led to the development of Supply Chain Finance (SCF) solutions, which aim at optimising the management of financial flows through collaboration among supply chain partners. Although it might seem straightforward that Logistics Service Providers (LSP) would take the lead in providing inventory-oriented SCF solutions to their customers, evidence of this happening is still scarce. The aim of this paper is to analyse relevant and insightful SCF solutions offered by LSPs in Europe, with a specific focus on the Netherlands.

This is a first step towards the mapping of SCF solutions that can be used by different types of LSPs, depending on the characteristics of both the LSPs and the SCF solutions.