Problem Statement: The client is one of the largest express carriers in Latin America providing both domestic and international express services. In 2009, they had acquired a domestic courier company to establish a strong foothold in the Brazilian market. However, 10 years on, all efforts at integrating the acquired company had failed. The business case for the acquisition - economies of scale, expanding the product portfolio, cost optimization - were all but lost.

Approach and Solution: We got to work by first building deep domain knowledge of the client's operational, shipping, and regulatory processes in a very short time. This was critical, given the complexity of the Brazilian logistics industry, which is one of the most tightly regulated markets globally.

Armed with this operational understanding, we created a business architecture blueprint that identified the key value streams and business capabilities needed to enable the shipment journey, customer journey, and revenue journey.

Our analysis revealed something remarkable: the in-house Transport Management System (TMS) had, over the years, entwined shipping and revenue processes with real-time regulatory requirements — specifically, manifest and tax declaration approvals without which no truck could depart.

Using the business architecture lens, we proposed a strategic separation: build a new application dedicated to managing regulatory processes. This would allow the shipping, customer, and revenue capabilities to migrate cleanly to the corporate systems without regulatory entanglements.

This strategy, rooted in a rapid understanding of operational nuances and an ecosystem-driven view of capabilities, led to a pragmatic and accelerated IT integration approach.

Benefits: The regulatory application was built on a war-footing, while more than 100 stations across Brazil were trained and readied with equipment to move to the standard operational processes. The first customer was on-boarded into the FMO within one year of the start of the engagement. Over the next couple of years, even through COVID, customer migration continued, finally delivering the economies of scale and cost savings promised in the acquisition business case.