MeridianConsensus
Industry coverage1 commissioned study · $920M in aggregate coverage

Transport & Logistics.

Supply-chain economics has become investible. Our commissioned studies cover freight modes, last-mile networks, warehousing, port infrastructure, and the reshaping of global trade flows under tariff regimes. Where spreadsheet-driven sizing ends, institutional committee review begins.

Our view

Thesis on Transport & Logistics.

Supply-chain economics has become investible. Our commissioned studies cover freight modes, last-mile networks, warehousing, port infrastructure, and the reshaping of global trade flows under tariff regimes. Where spreadsheet-driven sizing ends, institutional committee review begins.

Same methodology as every other Meridian verticalCommittee-reviewed before publication
What we research

Sub-sectors of Transport & Logistics.

Every sub-sector below is commissionable as a standalone 30-chapter study, or scoped bespoke for investment-committee and diligence use.

Freight & Intermodal

Road, rail, air-cargo and maritime freight, rate cycles, capacity utilisation, shipper-carrier dynamics, and the cross-modal substitution curves that drive spot-vs-contract mix.

Last-Mile & E-commerce Fulfilment

Parcel networks, micro-fulfilment, urban logistics, carrier consolidation economics, drone and autonomous-delivery pilot economics, and density-elasticity models.

Warehousing & 3PL

Industrial real-estate cycles, automation capex, 3PL margin structures, cold-chain dynamics, mezzanine and multi-storey build-out, and the labour-arbitrage economics of WMS-driven facilities.

Ports, Shipping & Trade Flows

Container-throughput cycles, alliance dynamics (2M / Gemini / THE), nearshoring pathways, tariff-driven re-routing, and the Cape / Suez / Panama routing arbitrage book.

Cold Chain & Pharma Logistics

Refrigerated freight, biologics distribution, temperature-controlled warehousing capacity, GxP-audited 3PL pricing, and the ultra-cold (−70 °C) specialty segment.

Fleet Management & Telematics

Fleet software, telematics OEMs, insurance-telematics economics, EV-fleet transition total-cost-of-ownership modelling, and fuel-card-plus-telematics bundling.

Freight Forwarding & Digital Brokerage

NVOCCs, global forwarders, digital-native brokers, spot-matching marketplaces, and the margin-compression cycle as contract-API access commoditises rate discovery.

Rail & Intermodal Terminals

Class-I rail operating ratios, precision-scheduled-railroading cycles, intermodal terminal throughput, drayage economics, and the shipper-terminal handshake productivity gap.

Air Cargo & Express Networks

Integrator hubs (FedEx/UPS/DHL/SF), belly-cargo capacity cycles, charter-freighter programmes, and the e-commerce cross-border express premium.

Supply-Chain Visibility & Execution Software

Control-tower platforms, multi-enterprise networks, real-time transportation visibility (RTTVP), TMS / YMS / WMS stack convergence, and the agentic-ops software wave.

Bulk & Commodity Shipping

Dry-bulk (Capesize / Panamax / Supramax), wet-bulk (VLCC / Suezmax / MR), LNG carriers, chemical tankers, and the fleet-age / order-book cycle driving rate visibility to 2027.

Customs, Trade Compliance & Cross-Border

Customs brokerage, trade-classification software, FTA utilisation consulting, sanctions screening, and the tariff-engineering book driving HTS-code optimisation revenue.

Interactive · live

A working transport & logistics dashboard.

Every commissioned transport & logistics study ships as an interactive dashboard, size and trajectory, ranked share, regional cuts, segmentation. Hover every bar to see the underlying figure; every number is traceable to a named source.

Interactive dashboard · live
Third-party logistics · specimen
MRI · Q2 2026
Overview
2025 size · 2026–2036 forecast · committee-signed
$1.09T
2019
$1.13T
2020
$1.18T
2021
$1.22T
2022
$1.27T
2023
$1.33T
2024
$1.38T
2025
$1.92T forecast
2030
$2.85T forecast
2036
Revenue trajectory (historical 2020 – Q1 2026 · forecast 2026–2036)
Headline figures
2025 size
$1.38T
2036 forecast
$2.85T +7.5% CAGR
Confidence
High
See a live report
Strategic themes · this quarter

What is moving in Transport & Logistics.

The priorities our research committee is tracking across the sector this quarter. Sub-sectors describe structure; themes describe motion. Reports commissioned against these themes ship with the latest signal-read baked in.

01

Tariff-driven re-routing

How US–China and EU tariff regimes are redirecting container flows through Mexico, Vietnam, and intermediary port hubs; our reports quantify the $/TEU cost of the new middle-leg.

02

Autonomous trucking commercial window

2026–2028 deployment timelines, revenue-per-mile economics, and insurance regulatory gating; the surviving stacks (Aurora / Kodiak / Plus) converge on hub-to-hub corridor routes.

03

Reverse-logistics margin compression

E-commerce returns handling costs exceeding outbound shipping on many categories; retailer policy responses (paid returns, final-sale SKUs) and the rise of liquidation-network pricing power.

04

Red Sea & Panama disruption pricing

Persistent re-routing premium on Europe–Asia freight; transit-time arbitrage economics and the asymmetric exposure of alliance members to Cape of Good Hope fuel-burn.

05

Cold-chain pharma capacity

GLP-1, cell-and-gene, and biologics volumes outstripping specialist 3PL capacity; the specialist-3PL acquisition window and investor build-out cycle through 2028.

06

Nearshoring to Mexico, the second leg

Post-USMCA Mexican cross-border truckload volumes growing 2× US domestic; intermodal capacity gaps in Laredo / El Paso and the chassis-dwell cost driving FEU pricing.

07

IMO 2030 maritime decarbonisation economics

Methanol, ammonia, and LNG dual-fuel newbuild pipelines; the green-corridor charter-rate premium and the retrofitting option value on the 2012-vintage fleet.

08

Digital freight brokerage consolidation

Convoy wind-down reset the sector; the remaining platforms (Uber Freight, C.H. Robinson Navisphere, Loadsmart) compete on contract penetration, not spot volume, margin thesis reframed.

09

Port-automation capex super-cycle

Rotterdam, Long Beach, Felixstowe, and Jebel Ali ramp ASC/ACC automation; Shanghai Zhenhua's order-book backlog drives a 5-year supplier bottleneck.

10

Parcel-carrier pricing discipline post-pandemic

UPS / FedEx GRIs outpacing volume; last-mile surcharge stacking and the USPS redirect thesis, expect mid-single-digit yield expansion through 2026.

11

E-commerce 3PL capacity unwind

Over-built warehouse supply in Tier-1 US markets normalises 2024–2026; occupancy troughs create an inflection point for asset-light aggregators.

12

Customs-tech and tariff-engineering revenue

Trade-classification software (e.g. Avalara Cross-Border, Descartes) attach-rate rising on SME cross-border sellers; tariff-engineering consulting revenue outpacing goods volume.

In the library

Commissioned studies.

All markets
Who uses this research

Role-tested in Transport & Logistics.

The four teams that most commonly commission transport & logistics research. Each role below maps to a specific use-case the commissioned study is scoped against, from diligence to annual planning.

Corporate Development · Logistics

Target screening and diligence on 3PLs, carriers, and freight-tech acquisitions.

Private Equity

Industrial-portfolio benchmarking and sector-rotation decisions across transport equities.

Strategy & CFO

Annual planning with sector-validated freight-rate, capacity-utilisation, and fuel-cost assumptions.

Equity Research

Coverage-note sector context for transportation equities, with cycle-position and peer-variance disclosure.

Commission research

A transport & logisticsmarket we haven’t yet covered?

Same methodology, same committee review, same written support. If you can describe the sub-sector, we can commission the study, accessible instantly on demand. Any geography, any boundary.

Adjacent coverage

Related verticals.

All industries

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