After a period of relative calm in the parcel market following the big acquisitions of 2005 and 2006 and the financial woes of Amtrak in 2008, DHL has shaken the sector up by selling off a large chunk of the former Securicor Omega operation it bought in 2005.
Its sale of the Domestic Day Definite operation is, in DHL's eyes at least, necessary in order to focus on what it believes are its core strengths of time-definite international express and same-day services, both in the UK and abroad.
"By fully focusing on the business fields with the biggest potential, we will strengthen our position in the UK market, safeguard our market leadership and ultimately protect our future," in its words.
Of course, what DHL won't admit, at least publicly, is that the business needed to be sold in order to stem losses at DHL Express UK, which worsened to £108.2m in its last financial year.
Speedy sale
Given that DHL is allowing the purchaser, Home Delivery Network (HDNL), to use its infrastructure and to retain the DHL Domestic brand in the short-term, plus rumours that HDNL received a multi-million sweetener on the deal, it's clear that DHL wanted shot of the operation.
A similar divestment has also taken place of the corresponding business in France, although this time the buyer is a private equity firm.
DHL's decision to rid itself of the operation is clearly being driven by new CEO Frank Appel, who replaced Klaus Zumwinkel in 2008, and is having to rid the company of various loss-making parts acquired by Zumwinkel during an ambitious spending spree that turned DHL into the world's largest logistics firm.
Although parts of the expansion strategy were successful - the acquisition of Exel, for example - others were less so: it spent a vast amount of money to enter the US market and then exited with "a severely bloodied nose" according to one postal analyst.
Rapid expansion
The analyst, who asked to remain anonymous, adds: "[Zumwinkel] was in a very expansionist mode, using the profits from the German postal operation to make it a global player in everything, but ended up buying companies it should never have touched.
"It owned 50% of Securicor for long enough to know what the issues were. Maybe he thought that they could turn it around."
He believes that there was no option but to sell the operation as losses would have got worse during the recession, but adds: "In a sense you can say it was lucky to find someone willing to take it off its hands."
Thomas Cullen, chief analyst at Transport Intelligence, is even more damning, describing the sale as "quite extraordinary".
He adds: "It's an important development because Europe is obviously a core market, particularly when contrasted with UPS and FedEx, yet it is divesting itself of key capabilities in two of the largest of those markets."
What it means is that suddenly its big US rivals UPS and FedEx, who don't have the same presence in Europe as DHL, have a much more comparable service offering against the German firm. In Cullen's words "it lowers the barriers of entry to the market".
He also believes that DHL has weakened itself against TNT, its only serious European rival, which has "adapted its model quite successfully to the new market trend for much lower cost services". He adds: "[DHL's sale] seems to be much more of a reaction to a crisis rather than TNT's actions."
Speedy sale
The winner of the piece at the moment seems to be HDNL - provided it can bring the two operations together successfully.
Although HDNL has had its own financial problems recently, the company now appears to have turned the corner and believes the acquisition will establish it as a major player in the UK. One analyst notes: "I think it's a high-risk strategy, but if anyone's going to pull it off, then HDNL might."
At a stroke it practically doubles HDNL's turnover and gives it access to the B2B market, complementing its existing B2C offering.
It also means its traditional hub-and-spoke model now has sufficient volume to work efficiently - without it, the market's view is that it would have had to adopt the 'lifestyle courier' model used by Hermes.