Why Malaysian couriers keep their own networks

If a marketplace can send you millions of parcels, why would a courier not simply become its delivery arm and take the volume?

Because the volume is the problem. Malaysian couriers have spent several years deliberately reducing their dependence on marketplace parcels, and the reasons are visible in what they now sell alongside delivery.

The economics of a commoditised parcel

Malaysia's express sector has been in an entrenched price war. A floor-price guideline introduced in December 2024 was largely ignored, being non-binding, and pricing stayed depressed. Operator numbers have fallen from a peak of around 130 to 150 down below 100, and consolidation has not restored pricing.

Meanwhile two players — J&T Express and SPX Xpress — together hold roughly 73.5% of the domestic market.

For everyone else that arithmetic is unforgiving. You cannot win on price against operators with that scale, and marketplace parcels are close to a pure price competition: same route, same weight, same service, decided on rate.

Volume at a loss is not a business. It is a way of being busy while your margin belongs to somebody else.

What a single-customer network actually risks

Concentration is the deeper danger. A courier deriving most volume from one marketplace has handed over its pricing power, and the relationship can be repriced or re-routed at the platform's convenience.

There is a structural version of the same risk: a marketplace with its own courier is a customer and a competitor at once. Serving it while competing with it is workable, but not something to depend on entirely.

An independent network — direct B2B customers, cross-border, retail drop-offs, other platforms — is what keeps that relationship a negotiation rather than an instruction.

What they are building instead

The diversification is specific and public.

Ninja Van Malaysia moved into cold chain, handling over a hundred thousand parcels a month, plus warehousing, cross-border freight and B2B inventory services. Its management has described integrated logistics as the next competitive edge.

GDEX launched GDEX 2.0 in 2022, adding IT services, smart retail systems and cybersecurity. Its chief executive put the logic plainly: when customers need end-to-end solutions, pricing becomes less sensitive.

Pos Malaysia has repositioned from mail operator to technology-driven logistics group, adding retail, aviation and digital services.

The common thread is escaping a market where the only variable is rate. Cold chain requires equipment and competence. Warehousing creates switching costs. A retail network has value beyond parcels. None of that is true of moving a box from A to B at the lowest bid.

What this means for the seller

The strategy above is why your fulfilment costs behave the way they do.

The cheapest rate keeps moving. Couriers are repricing away from loss-making volume, so a rate negotiated last year may not be available now, and the carrier that was cheapest for your profile may have deliberately stopped competing for it.

Bundled services change the comparison. When a courier sells warehousing or cold chain with delivery, the delivery rate stops being comparable to a pure carrier's rate. It may be lower and carry a commitment, or higher and include something you were paying for elsewhere.

Multi-carrier is now normal. Different carriers are genuinely better for different destinations, weights and service levels, and the notion of one courier for everything is largely gone. Which means several invoices, several formats, several reference schemes.

Marketplace and direct rates diverge. The rate inside a marketplace settlement reflects the platform's negotiated position, not yours. Your direct rate for the same parcel will differ, sometimes substantially, and comparing channel profitability without accounting for that produces the wrong answer.

The accounting problem this creates

Three or four carriers, each invoicing on its own cycle in its own format against its own consignment reference, none of which is your order number.

The specific difficulties:

Matching invoices to orders. The join is the consignment note, which lives in your fulfilment records rather than your accounts, if it was captured at all.

Adjustments after the fact. Weight corrections, zone reclassifications and surcharges arrive weeks later against consignments you have already costed.

Failed and returned deliveries. Usually still chargeable, sometimes twice, and rarely reflected in the margin figure for the order that generated them.

COD remittance. Where the courier collects cash, the remittance arrives net of both delivery and collection fees, on a lag, as a lump sum covering many orders — its own reconciliation entirely. See managing cash on delivery.

Anyone treating shipping as one monthly number is missing all four, and shipping is frequently the second-largest cost line in an ecommerce business after the goods themselves.

What the seller should change

Capture the consignment note against the order at the point of fulfilment. Retrofitting it later is close to impossible, and it is the only reliable join between a courier invoice and a sale.

Cost shipping per order, not per month. Averaging hides the orders where a low-value item travelled a long way.

Reconcile courier invoices like any other supplier statement — line by line, with adjustments queried rather than absorbed. See supplier statement reconciliation with AI.

Keep the marketplace and direct costs separate in your reporting, because they are different commercial arrangements and merging them makes both meaningless.

Common questions

Why do Malaysian couriers not simply serve the marketplaces exclusively?

Because marketplace parcels are close to pure price competition, and with J&T Express and SPX Xpress together holding roughly 73.5% of the domestic market, smaller operators cannot win on rate. Depending on one platform for most volume also surrenders pricing power to a customer that may also be a competitor, so couriers keep independent networks to stay in a negotiation rather than taking instructions.

What are Malaysian couriers diversifying into?

Higher-margin services that are harder to commoditise. Ninja Van Malaysia has moved into cold chain, warehousing, cross-border freight and B2B inventory; GDEX added IT services, smart retail systems and cybersecurity under its GDEX 2.0 strategy; and Pos Malaysia has repositioned as a technology-driven logistics group with retail, aviation and digital services.

Why is finding a cheap courier rate getting harder?

Because carriers are actively repricing away from loss-making parcel volume after a prolonged price war in which a non-binding floor-price guideline was largely ignored. A rate available last year may have been withdrawn, and the carrier that once suited your parcel profile may have deliberately stopped competing for that business.

How should a seller account for multiple couriers?

Capture the consignment note against the order at the point of fulfilment, since it is the only reliable join between a courier invoice and a sale. Cost shipping per order rather than per month, reconcile each courier invoice line by line like a supplier statement, and keep marketplace-deducted shipping separate from directly invoiced shipping because they are different commercial arrangements.

Related: why Shopee partners with courier companies · managing cash on delivery · supplier statement reconciliation with AI