Why a marketplace does not buy its couriers

A marketplace with enormous parcel volume and a clear commercial interest in delivery performance could, in principle, buy or build its entire delivery network. Some platforms operate their own delivery arms alongside partners, which is a middle position rather than full ownership.

The reason full ownership is rare is not capital. It is that delivery economics reward density, and no single customer generates enough of it.

Density is the whole business

Last-mile cost is driven by how many parcels a driver delivers per route.

A van covering a residential area with forty stops costs roughly what a van with fifteen stops costs — the vehicle, the fuel, the driver's day are much the same. The cost per parcel is completely different.

So the economics reward a network carrying everyone's parcels along the same street: the marketplace's, the independent store's, the business documents, the bank statements. Each additional consignment on an existing route is close to pure contribution.

A network carrying only one customer's parcels has systematically lower density than one carrying everybody's, on the same roads, with the same vehicles. That is the structural argument, and it does not go away with scale.

What a captive network would cost

Four costs that a shared network avoids and a captive one carries in full.

Idle capacity between peaks. Ecommerce volume is spiky — festive periods, campaign days, weekends. A network sized for peak is underused the rest of the time, and a network sized for average fails at peak. A shared carrier smooths this across customers with different peaks — see delivery during a sales peak.

Full coverage obligation. A national network has to serve rural areas and East Malaysia, where density is lowest and cost per parcel highest. A carrier spreads that across all its customers; a captive network absorbs it alone.

Fixed infrastructure. Sorting facilities, vehicles, access points, systems, and people. Enormous capital, and it becomes a fixed cost that has to be covered whether volume arrives or not.

Operating a different business. Logistics is not marketplace operation. Different capabilities, different regulation, different labour model, different failure modes.

Against that, partnership costs a margin paid to the carrier and keeps every one of those problems on someone whose business it is.

What partnership actually buys

The interesting question is what a platform can get from partners without ownership, and the answer turns out to be most of what it wanted.

Performance standards, by defining measures and applying them across partners — see the Shopee courier collaboration explained.

Visibility, through integrated tracking rather than through owning the trucks.

Shared infrastructure such as access points, where the cost is spread rather than duplicated.

Competitive pressure. Several carriers competing for volume produces better rates and service than an internal department with guaranteed work. This is the underrated one — a captive network has no competitive discipline.

Flexibility. Volume can be shifted between partners as performance or price changes. An owned network cannot be reallocated.

The partial exception is a platform running its own delivery arm alongside partners, which gives a capability floor and a benchmark while leaving most volume with carriers whose density is better. That is a hedge rather than a commitment to full ownership.

Why the carriers stay independent

The mirror of the same logic, and it explains why carriers accept collaboration but not capture.

Their density depends on carrying everyone. A carrier exclusive to one platform loses the other volume that made its routes efficient, which raises its own cost per parcel.

Concentration is a commercial risk. A carrier deriving most of its revenue from one customer has very little pricing power and an existential dependency.

Diversification is where their margin is. Several Malaysian operators have deliberately built capability beyond standard parcel delivery, into cold chain, warehousing, business logistics and adjacent services, precisely because standard parcel work is where price competition is fiercest — see courier diversification beyond parcels.

So both sides prefer partnership. The platform gets standards and visibility without capital; the carriers get volume without dependency.

The same logic in your own business

The principle generalises, and it is the reason this is worth a merchant's attention rather than being industry trivia.

Ownership is worth it where the thing is your differentiator, where you have enough volume for the fixed cost to make sense, and where doing it yourself is genuinely better. Partnership is worth it where someone else has density, specialisation or scale you cannot match.

For most Malaysian retailers, delivery is squarely in the second category — see warehousing, fulfilment and when to outsource.

What you should own is the information: which parcel went with which carrier, what it cost, whether it arrived, and what that means for the margin on the order. That is where the decisions get made, and it is the part no partner will do for you — see capturing the consignment note against the order.

Common questions

Why do marketplaces partner with couriers instead of buying them?

Because delivery economics reward density, and a network carrying only one customer's parcels has systematically fewer stops per route than one carrying everybody's. A captive network also absorbs idle capacity between peaks, full rural and East Malaysian coverage, and heavy fixed infrastructure alone, all of which a shared carrier spreads across many customers.

What can a platform get from partners without owning them?

Performance standards defined and applied across carriers, visibility through integrated tracking, shared infrastructure such as access points where the cost is spread rather than duplicated, competitive pressure between carriers that an internal department would not face, and the flexibility to shift volume as price or performance changes.

Why do couriers avoid becoming exclusive to one platform?

Because their density depends on carrying everyone's parcels along the same routes, so exclusivity would raise their own cost per parcel. Concentration also removes pricing power and creates an existential dependency, and several Malaysian operators have found their margin in services beyond standard parcel delivery rather than in volume from any single customer.

How does this apply to a retailer?

The same test: own what differentiates you and where your volume justifies the fixed cost, partner where someone else has density or specialisation you cannot match. For most Malaysian retailers delivery is firmly in the second category. What you should own is the information — which carrier took which parcel, what it cost and whether it arrived.

Related: why Shopee partners with courier companies · the economics of last-mile delivery in Malaysia · why Malaysian couriers keep their own networks