SAN PEDRO GARZA GARCÍA, NL.- A small and medium-sized company (SME) does not struggle to grow in Mexico, but to survive. In the country there are just over four million economic units in this category, which are 99% of established companies and where seven out of 10 jobs are generated, according to official data.
Most new SMEs do not survive their third year of life due to the challenges of not having financing possibilities, but also due to incorrect management of their logistics activities , the lack of technological tools and infrastructure.
“It is more difficult for an SME to access international markets first because of its financial capacity and then its operational and productive capacity,” said Mauricio Medina, CEO of TIP Mexico , during his participation in ETYL 2024 , a Grupo T21 event, during the panel Logistics solutions for SMEs in the T-MEC .
He added that for the 25% of SMEs that do have access to credit, the financial costs in the country can lead to higher operating costs.
In the logistics field, companies such as Quintaesencia Logística have sought to support the SME segment with specialized services , given the knowledge that these are companies that may not be consistent in their shipments or when they need to transport their goods they are small in size.
“We realized that there were many companies that were not being served as they should be or as they demanded precisely because of their size,” said Adrián Hernández, general manager of Quintaesencia Logística, during the ETYL, who explained that in the last decade they have dedicated themselves to building networks with their transport providers such as trucking companies, maritime lines and railway companies in order to have spaces available for SMEs when they need them.
The services offered by Quintaesencia Logística also incorporate visibility and traceability of goods , since for SMEs having this often means surviving or disappearing, given that a large part of the assets that will provide liquidity to these companies once their goods are placed in the final markets can be transported in a container.
In these circumstances, logistics operators must develop operational involvement with SMEs, as well as provide flexibility, according to Adrián Hernández.
This same flexibility has led railroad companies like Canadian Pacific Kansas City (CPKC) to bring more SMEs onto the rail network, allowing them to take advantage of the connectivity it offers across all three North American countries.
“How can we bring rail to small and medium-sized businesses? The first thing is to have system capacity and we have a new service that is competing directly with trucks, it is called the MMX, which is a train that is going from San Luis Potosí to Chicago consistently in 3.8 days,” said David Eaton, commercial director of CPKC de México.
Finally, the specialists agreed that the incorporation of technology will facilitate the operations of SMEs, since they can count on reductions in storage costs, operational efficiency, inventory forecasts and improvements in production.
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