One year after launching an air cargo service for third-party shippers utilizing its parcel freighters, Amazon is offering a money-back guarantee to attract businesses that prioritize on-time delivery and upgraded its digital portal so customers can more easily quote, book and manage air shipments.
Amazon Air Cargo is the latest example of Amazon opening its logistics network and capabilities to outsiders using a model similar to how it sells access to cloud services through Amazon Web Services (AWS). More importantly, management is leveraging Amazon Web Services to further optimize outsourced logistics services, including the wholesale air cargo business.
Amazon has made a habit of commercially selling best-in-class services originally developed to support internal operations. The retailer built its own last-mile delivery and warehousing network to better control the customer experience, and now provides fulfillment and logistics service to other sellers on its marketplace. In 2016, it launched Amazon Air to enable next-day and second-day day delivery to more Prime members and now operates an air network with more than 100 cargo jets and more than 65 destinations. As e-commerce sales slowed to a more normalized growth rate and Amazon shifted towards more regional and local fulfillment centers, the company began offering excess air capacity to logistics providers and other businesses.
“With AWS we built massive computing capabilities for ourselves, and then learned how to share those with customers in really valuable ways. Air Cargo has a similar story. We built a dense, reliable, and interconnected air network to serve Amazon customers quickly — and now we’re discovering that many others can benefit from that same network,” said Kres Nielsen, director of business development at Amazon Air Cargo, according to a transcript of his remarks on Oct. 21 at the Future of Freight Festival hosted by FreightWaves in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
Nielsen joined the Amazon Air Cargo team from AWS earlier this year.
“We’re working closely with AWS on integrated, cloud-based supply chain solutions — helping customers manage logistics more efficiently and intelligently. And I’m especially excited about how agentic AI can help — optimizing routes, identifying opportunities, and supporting customers with predictive insights,” he said during a Q&A session. “Our predictive and forecasting tools, the same ones that power Amazon Retail, can now help suppliers and retailers plan more efficiently across their supply chains. We’re connecting all of Amazon’s capabilities — freight, last mile, analytics — into unified, end-to-end solutions. Customers can now access analytics, visibility, and full supply chain support in one place.”
In September 2024, Amazon fully commercialized a wholesale air cargo service it had tested for years. Shippers can tender freight on an ad hoc basis, reserve regular blocks of space or charter entire aircraft. Amazon also offers air cargo service in Europe and India, where it operates more limited networks.
Amazon Air, the internal cargo airline, doesn’t have its own pilots or an air operating certificate. It manages the in-house parcel flows, routes and capacity, while relying on contract carriers to operate its fleet of mostly Boeing 737-800 and 767 freighter aircraft, along with 10 Airbus A330-300 converted freighters. This year it acquired a used A330-300 from a leasing company that will be reconfigured by an aircraft conversion specialist before joining the fleet.
Since the start, executives have reassured freight forwarders their cargo won’t be held from full flights to preserve space for Amazon parcels, pointing to dynamic technology, a vast ground transportation network and millions of route combinations that allows the company to make real-time transit adjustments and ensure shipments reach their destination on time.
“That control gives us the ability to move things efficiently and prioritize customer needs,” Nielsen said.
Amazon Air Cargo has doubled its customer base over the past 15 months, a spokesperson said via email, but the exact scale of the business remains unclear. Launch customers included logistics giant Kuehne+Nagel, which is using Amazon Air Cargo to relay e-commerce shipments from China to the U.S. mainland via Honolulu, and DHL Express.
In the spring, Amazon began operating daily flights between Miami and Bogotá, carrying e-commerce packages to Colombia and returning with flowers and other commodities tendered by the cargo division of flag-carrier Avianca. Several months later, Amazon Air Cargo extended third-party cargo service to the Dominican Republic to support Miami-based cargo agent ALK Global Logistics, opening opportunities in the perishables market. Both routes are flown by North Carolina-based 21 Air.
Air Premia, a passenger airline based in South Korea, in July entered into a transportation services agreement with Amazon Air Cargo under which it transfers belly cargo to Amazon at Honolulu airport for onward carriage to the continental United States. Once at U.S. hubs, the Air Premia shipments are relayed to 45 cities, including Atlanta and Houston, through the Amazon Air network.
The for-hire air carrier is also moving thousands of Maui Gold pineapples from Hawaii to the East Coast in about 12 hours every week. Nielsen said Amazon has also connected U.S. cherry growers with markets in Asia with its Hawaii flights.
Money-back guarantee
To prove it can follow through on its promise, Amazon Air Cargo in October began offering a money-back guarantee to new customers in the U.S. and Puerto Rico. If a shipment doesn’t arrive within two hours of its scheduled time due to a service failure, Amazon will refund shipping fees up to $10,000 per flight, according to slides from a presentation Nielsen made at The International Air Cargo Association’s annual exhibition in Dubai early last month. The deal is valid for 12 months starting with the first shipment.
Money-back guarantees have historically been limited to premium express products offered by integrated carriers like FedEx, UPS and DHL because their business models are built around end-to-end control, time-definite networks, and the ability to manage liability on a closed system. They are rare in the traditional air cargo sector because multiple handoffs between forwarders, airlines, airport ground handlers, warehouse operators, trucking companies and other intermediaries creates more variability and less direct control for any one party.
Some forwarders do offer performance guarantees for key accounts, but they tend to be contract-specific, negotiated, not widely advertised and tied to to very controlled routings or premium handling arrangements, Brandon Fried, executive director of the Airforwarders Association, explained in an email message.
Amazon Air Cargo’s money-back guarantee “signals a push to position their air network more like a classic integrator product — tight control, predictable delivery windows, and enough confidence to put financial skin in the game. If they frame this as a broad commitment rather than a niche service feature, it could put competitive pressure on others in the e-commerce and express space,” he said.
John Costanzo, the president and CEO of LDK Global Logistics, questioned whether Amazon needs to offer a money-back guarantee because few can reliably provide dedicated, express domestic air service.
“I see Amazon Cargo as a physical version of Amazon Web Services, which almost everyone uses as their IT platform today. Eventually, I believe most forwarders will utilize Amazon’s cargo network as it’s a much better option for capacity, scheduling and likely pricing since Amazon is filling excess capacity and building their network with this additional volume. They already have a great value proposition without having to offer guaranteed delivery service between point A & B,” he said in an email exchange.
Shipments must be booked through the new self-developed Supply Chain by Amazon console. Amazon recently moved from a manual, offline booking process to a digital one. The digital system provides instant rate quotes and capacity availability; immediate reservations, with guaranteed space for any booked shipment three days; real-time shipment monitoring; billing and payments; and support services in a single dashboard.
“We’re trying to remove all friction and worry from what’s often a very time-sensitive process,” Nielsen said.
Click here for more FreightWaves/American Shipper stories by Eric Kulisch.
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