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By Paul Page 

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Amazon.com Inc. is pushing deeper into an unlikely growth area for e-commerce retailers : brick-and-mortar stores. The company is bulking up its grocery strategy with a plan to introduce convenience stores with curbside pickup, the WSJ's Greg Bensinger and Laura Stevens report. It's a high-stakes bid to bring new competition to the retail industry by going after the grocery business that provides big sales Amazon's biggest rival, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. Amazon plans to bring its tech focus to the business, combining smaller sites that hold perishable goods with online ordering for customers that can pick up their groceries or provide same-day delivery for items that have longer shelf life. They would take a cue from discounters and dollar stores that have spartan stores, private-label inventory and few employees. The effort carries big logistics challenges: big-box retailers have used grocery operations to lure customers into their stores, but Target Corp. is still struggling to keep shelves stocked without letting inventory costs spiral out of control.

Hanjin Shipping Co. is stepping in to help resolve the logistics mess created by the carrier's thousands of empty containers. The bankrupt shipping line is offering to pick up empties at two West Coast port terminals "effective immediately," an action that should help relieve some stress on sites now jammed up with the boxes. Besides tying up space, WSJ Logistics Report's Erica E. Phillips writes, thousands of the containers are attached to the wheeled trailers known as chassis that are needed to move goods on and off the docks. And some ports have stopped accepting Hanjin containers because they don't have the space to store them. The confusion over boxes is part of the supply-chain mess that's followed the South Korean carrier's declaration of bankruptcy in August. Questions over shipping payments and fees remain, however, and those may take longer to resolve than it will take to clear away Hanjin's empty containers.

The British pound's swoon has caught many corporate finance chiefs off guard and left multinationals scrambling to assess the impact. The pound's weakness since the Brexit referendum is forcing many companies to adjust their foreign-exchange hedging, the WSJ's Nina Trentmann reports, especially given that the currency is expected to remain volatile at least until the U.K. begins separation negotiations with its former EU partners. That's a big concern to logistics companies that have operations that reach across various borders, particularly since the currency shifts can affect payments and revenue calculations. Higher costs are expected to hit the supply chains of many importers, and many are adjusting. Companies including German tire maker Continental AG and Swedish paper producer Svenska Cellulosa AB have raised their prices to meet the higher costs. The currency, which was trading at about $1.46 to the pound at the start of the summer, extended its steep post-Brexit slide on Tuesday, falling 2% to about $1.21.

SUPPLY CHAIN STRATEGIES

General Motors Co. is looking to close the door completely on one of its longtime suppliers . The car maker is asking a judge to end a litigation battle with bankrupt auto-parts provider Clark-Cutler-McDermott Co., the WSJ's Sarah Chaney writes, in a case that highlights the shifting landscape for auto companies and the vast network of suppliers in a changing in manufacturing industry. CCM, which filed for bankruptcy protection in July, claims in a suit that GM lied in price negotiations and tricked the company into a money-losing contract that buried the business in debt. The 115-year-old company -- a GM "Supplier of the Year" four times in the last seven years -- depended on GM for about 80% of its business. The auto-parts is industry is under growing pressure as car makers adjust to new consumer demands and scale up technology in their vehicles, pushing companies across auto supply chains to team up with new partners while adding features to their components.

Samsung Electronic Co.'s botched recall of its Galaxy Note 7 smartphone puts a spotlight on the ability of companies to oversee supply chains across a sprawling network of varied suppliers. That concern has mounted as escalating demands in the technology world put more pressure on companies to build and upgrade products more swiftly, the WSJ technology team writes. The company initially blamed the fires that finally crashed their new smartphone on one bad battery supplier, but industry analysts suspect the company's problems run deeper. Experts say supply-chain complexity can begin within a company and be exacerbated when different departments within a corporation, and their suppliers, fail to communicate or coordinate effectively. Some believe developing blockchain technology can help companies manage third-party suppliers, but efforts to build true transparency across a full-blown global supply chain remain challenging.

There's new research that suggests a relatively inexpensive way to add highway capacity: get people to drive better. In fact, Seattle engineer William Beaty says the strategies that researchers call "jam-absorption driving" are relatively basic even if they can seem counter-intuitive to most drivers. Mr. Beaty tells WSJ Work & Family columnist Sue Shellenbarger he's advocating "things that traffic experts and long-haul truckers have known forever." Mr. Beaty counsels techniques such as leaving a large gap between your car and the one in front and letting other drivers freely cut in. The point is to eliminate stop-and-go frustration, and keep vehicles moving at a steady, if seemingly slower, pace. Highway planners already are designing roads, including the ability to use information on accidents and variable speed limits, with such strategies in mind. And researchers say that could make driving easier even without adding roads.

QUOTABLE

IN OTHER NEWS

The U.K. and China agreed to remove any limits on cargo flights between the countries. (WSJ)

U.S. agricultural officials are stepping in to help oversupplied dairy farmers for the second time in less than three months, pledging to buy another $20 million worth of cheddar cheese. (WSJ)

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV and the union representing nearly 10,000 workers at car factories in Canada struck a tentative labor deal. (WSJ)

General Electric Co. is buying LM Wind Power, a manufacturer and supplier of rotor blades to the wind industry, for $1.65 billion. (WSJ)

Earnings at Alcoa Inc. grew less than expected in the third quarter on lower alumina pricing and changes to aerospace components delivery schedules. (WSJ)

Industrial parts provider Fastenal Inc. says its quarterly profit slipped even as sales grew 1.8%. (WSJ)

Amazon.com Inc. is barring new merchants from sending inventory to its Fulfillment by Amazon warehouses ahead of the holidays. (Bloomberg)

The U.S. Coast Guard was working to repair storm destruction that limited water access to Georgia's Port of Savannah. (Savannah Morning News)

Atlas Air Worldwide Holdings Inc. added five planes to its order with Boeing Co. to convert four 767 passenger aircraft to freighters. (MarketWatch)

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and the Thai government say they will form a joint working group to develop digital commerce in Thailand. (Bangkok Post)

South Korean truck drivers began a strike aimed at a government plan to overhaul industry regulation. (Business Korea)

It will cost the world's shipowners some $18 billion to comply with new rules on treatment of ballast water to control the spread of invasive species. (Times of London)

JLL Inc. forecast that strong demand and higher prices in the U.S. industrial property market would continue into 2018. (DC Velocity)

The Transported Assets Protection Association says cargo theft has soared across Europe this year. (The Loadstar)

Russia lifted its ban on imports of some agricultural products from Turkey. (FruitNet)

Ship broker Braemar ACM says demolition of container ships has reached record levels this year. (Lloyd's Loading List)

U.S. beef exports jumped 26.9% year-over-year in August, leading an overall surge in meat exports. (American Shipper)

ABOUT US

Paul Page is deputy editor of WSJ Logistics Report. Follow him at @PaulPage, and follow the entire WSJ Logistics Report team: @brianjbaskin, @lorettachao, @RWhelanWSJ and @EEPhillips_WSJ, and follow the WSJ Logistics Report on Twitter at @WSJLogistics.

Subscribe to this email newsletter by clicking here: http://on.wsj.com/Logisticsnewsletter .

Write to Paul Page at paul.page@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 12, 2016 04:30 ET (08:30 GMT)

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