“Yandex” goes to postmen

Against the backdrop of the suspension of work in Russia of the international company DHL Express, new players appear on the express delivery market. “Yandex Delivery” decided to scale its service throughout the country, launching long-distance delivery through pickup points. Experts believe that the new service was needed by “Yandex” to expand the network of points of issue of orders (PVZ). According to this indicator, the company lags behind its competitors – Wildberries and Ozon.

“Yandex Delivery” at the end of October will launch the delivery of parcels through the points of issue of orders “Yandex Market” between different cities of Russia, a representative of the company told Kommersant. Now the service included in the Yandex Go application is being tested on a limited audience.

At the first stage, long-distance delivery will be available between Moscow and St. Petersburg, by the end of 2022 – throughout the Yandex Market pickup point network in more than 40 cities of the country.

After the suspension of work in Russia by DHL Express, CDEK, PickPoint, DPD, Boxberry, EMS of Russian Post remain major players in the express delivery market in the country, says Mikhail Burmistrov, CEO of Infoline-Analytics.

The Yandex Delivery service will be available to individuals and entrepreneurs. The shipment can be issued through the Yandex Go application, where the sender and recipient will be able to monitor the status of the parcel. According to a company representative, delivery prices will be fixed, the cost of the tariff depends on the city of delivery and the size of the parcel, the weight of which should not exceed 12 kg. For long-distance delivery, Yandex Delivery may involve third-party companies, a service representative specified.

Also in 2023, the company plans to launch the possibility of long-distance sending of parcels from the sender’s address to the recipient without visiting the points of issue.

As Kommersant was specified in Yandex Delivery, in this case, a composite supply chain is assumed. “After the courier takes the parcel from the sender, the parcels will be sorted by destination addresses, and then they will go to another city,” the company explains.

Long-distance delivery between the points of issue of orders will not require high costs from Yandex due to the ability to use the capacities of Yandex Market when delivering parcels, says Data Insight partner Fedor Virin. At the same time, to launch a service for delivery from the sender’s house to the recipient’s door, the company will need new technological solutions to optimize the delivery process, which, in addition to cargo transportation, will also include a courier link.

Yandex believes that long-distance delivery will be in demand by owners of small online stores, as well as small business entrepreneurs who mainly sell goods through social networks and instant messengers.

Gradually, other large marketplaces may also begin to develop their own logistics services, including to increase the attractiveness and profitability of the operations of pick-up points for franchise partners, believes Mikhail Burmistrov.

According to the expert, competition between marketplaces today is associated with the ability to provide their partners who open pickup points with additional sources of income in the face of growing logistics costs. Wildberries and Ozon demonstrate higher rates of expanding the network of such points, so for Yandex, connecting the delivery service will be an opportunity to attract more partners and accelerate the development of the pickup point, Mr. Burmistrov believes. In turn, Fedor Virin notes that today there is room for a new player in the express delivery segment against the backdrop of high volumes of interregional shipments across Russia.

Alina Savitskaya