eCourier: Journey of an IT firm turning into a digital logistics company

From a parcel tracking solution software company whose products did not fare well with potential entrepreneurs, to the country's largest 360 logistics brand within 9 years, eCourier has certainly come a long way. And behind the concept and continuous innovation is an electronic and communication engineering graduate, a much respected and loved personality, Biplob Ghosh Rahul. 

From a modest start with two bicycles, it has grown into a major digital courier service provider with a countrywide network connecting manufacturers, sellers and buyers. As one of the pioneers in both pickup and delivery services, eCourier delivered 11 parcels in Dhaka city on the first day of operation, 9 years down the lane, it now handles roughly 30,000+ orders daily in 64 districts.

The man behind the venture, Biplob Ghosh Rahul, blended his academic skills, professional courses and work experience -- work for mobile operator Robi Axiata and software association BASIS-- to develop eCourier as a unique business model. His brief attachment to FedEx in 2014 as part of the Entrepreneurship Exchange Program in US University of Oklahoma gave him extra mileage in transforming his venture into a modern-day logistics service provider.

eCourier has evolved with time. That was why it thrived the most during the Covid-19 pandemic when people were forced to stay indoors, and supply chains were broken. In fact, those were the days for courier service providers to show what a crucial role they can play in the supply chain during such difficult times. 

In 2000, the first year of the Covid-19 that kept transportation almost shut for months, eCourier served 24,000 merchant partners and processed around 10,000 orders daily, which went up to 17,000 during the 2021 peak of the pandemic. 

Moving ahead with the time

eCourier has continued its efforts to stay ahead of the time. It embraced every possible service and technology it felt essential to move forward. 

In February 2021, when the country, like the whole world, was still under the grip of Covid-19, eCourier launched an end-to-end 360 Portfolio in delivery services through 14 offices and over 1,500 employees across the country.

e-courier launched air parcel service to speed up delivery and pickup of products in districts using domestic airports within the same day. It also launched person-to-person (P2P), corporate and merchant delivery services, line haul and automatic warehouse facilities. 

Breaking the traditional norms, with P2P delivery services, customers no longer need to travel to a booking agent or location and stand in a queue to drop or pick parcels. Across Bangladesh, eCourier agents, using mostly environment friendly transportation, pick and drop parcels from customers and merchants' home or office bringing convenience to users, saving valuable time, minimizing the load on our already desperate traffic system and contributing to lowering the carbon footprint.   

eCourier also launched for the first time in Bangladesh, warehousing services for F-Commerce merchants. With eCourier taking control of warehousing, merchants can focus on their core business and not waste space at their home or office while eCourier uses its Smart Warehouse hub to keep. Track and deliver their products. 

eCourier has been a true partner to the f-commerce industry and its stakeholders from the beginning. Continuing the practice, eCourier signed an MoU with the largest Women Entrepreneurs forum in Bangladesh, WE, to prioritize and exclusively deliver and promote locally made products by women entrepreneurs representing the SME and Cottage industry. 

The digital courier service provider is also the first and only logistics brand to have signed an agreement with a local payment gateway to act as the Escrow Verification Facilitator between merchants and customers.

In 2022, eCourier, in collaboration with Master Card and Mutual Trust Bank, launched the first-ever F-commerce Co-brand Prepaid Card in Bangladesh, designed to facilitate Facebook Commerce business for Women Entrepreneurs. The initiative aims at improving financial inclusion among women entrepreneurs and will help advance towards the government's financial inclusion vision as women constitute 80-90 percent of the F-commerce entrepreneurs. The card comes with offers and exclusive discounts on e-commerce portals, jewelry shops, grocery, and clothing stores specially designed for these card holders. 

On this initiative, Biplob commented, "We are thrilled to collaborate with Mastercard and Mutual Trust Bank Limited and launch the first ever Co-brand Prepaid Card for Women Entrepreneurs. At eCourier, we have been supporting women entrepreneurs and their endeavors through customized state of the art logistics solutions for the last 9 years. I truly believe financial inclusion of women in general and f-commerce merchants in particular, will be a game changer and bring about a positive impact to our economy." 

Later in the same year, to further expand its portfolio and coverage, eCourier entered into a commercial agreement with Aramex that will utilize their combined strengths to unlock Bangladesh's international delivery potential. The collaboration aims to use eCourier's national network for pick and drop of official parcels and documents from Bangladesh to 70 global hubs across the world, as well as provide opportunities to develop product and technology solutions together with Aramax. On the occasion, Mahbubul Matin, President at Dotlines, parent company of eCourier mentioned, "Our aim is to bring new products and opportunities to Bangladeshi businesses and consumers through unique access to our networks, and our technology and logistical capabilities." He further mentioned, "We treat each parcel as a story and our task is to deliver the emotion behind each story, with care, to its destination, locally and from today onwards, internationally."

Also in 2022, to transform and disrupt the logistics industry of Bangladesh, eCourier launched its first offline parcel drop and pick service across the country. Through the offline concept, individuals, merchants, and corporations would be able to drop and pick up parcels from a nearby eCourier brand-shop or its extended partner outlets or eCourier express points, for quicker, convenient, and more affordable logistics services. 

Through this initiative, eCourier will be launching 100 brand-shops and 5,000 eCourier Express points throughout Bangladesh by third quarter of 2023. All services will have end-to-end tracking facilities and OTP verification enabling general consumers, merchants, and corporates to fulfill their delivery needs under one single umbrella with enhanced security. The new delivery services are expected to boost speed, flexibility, and accuracy of the delivery. 

In December last year, eCourier launched the first on demand instant payment service 'Insta Pay' which will facilitate its merchants and businesses receive due payments of cash on delivery, instantly, when delivery is completed upon receiving the cash. As a result, for products, parcels or documents delivered at any location in Bangladesh, merchants can expect to receive their payments digitally and instantly without any delay. On the occasion, Biplob commented, "We truly believe in the potential of fCommerce and SME merchants. InstaPay is a revolutionary service that came out of our relentless pursuit of making business processes simple and convenient for our merchants."

Its innovative endeavors did not stop there. eCourier thought about the security of its customers' parcels. The company signed an agreement with insurance aggregator Carnival Assure bringing its pickup service parcels under insurance for delivery across the country. Customers can take insurance options when booking parcels in the "Person to Person" category for delivery service. Sena Kalyan Insurance Company Limited (SKICL) will provide the insurance while digital insurance platform Carnival Assure will aggregate the service. The insurance coverage will continue till the parcel is delivered from the customer's home to the recipient. The eCourier CEO hopes that the inclusion of insurance will strengthen eCourier's position in the market through gaining customers' trust.

All these innovative customer services put eCourier well ahead of many others in the logistics sector.

Before venturing into logistics service, Biplob formed a small Information Technology (IT) solution firm, Softcall, to serve in an area he knew well. But he chose to step beyond and continued his journey ahead. 

From a Tk 10 lakh small firm, it is now a growing business with Tk500 crore in assets. And it is growing every day, enjoying trusts of customers, retailers and manufacturers, big or small.