Joint participation at BIX 2026

Expanded pharmaceutical transport and storage services

Three hubs in Icheon, Jangji and Geomdan

Tailored logistics consultations on offer

DHL Express, DHL Global Forwarding and DHL Supply Chain — DHL's three South Korea divisions — jointly participate in BioPlus-Interphex Korea 2026 (BIX 2026), which opened Wednesday at COEX in Seoul, showcasing their healthcare logistics services. [DHL]
DHL Express, DHL Global Forwarding and DHL Supply Chain — DHL's three South Korea divisions — jointly participate in BioPlus-Interphex Korea 2026 (BIX 2026), which opened Wednesday at COEX in Seoul, showcasing their healthcare logistics services. [DHL]

Global logistics company DHL is bringing together the services of its three South Korean divisions to target the domestic pharmaceutical and biotech market. The company plans to support local biotech firms in building their supply chains by offering an integrated logistics system spanning clinical trial drug transport during the research and development phase, overseas exports, domestic storage and hospital delivery.

DHL announced Thursday that it participated in BioPlus-Interphex Korea 2026 (BIX 2026), which opened Wednesday at COEX in Seoul, under its integrated life sciences and healthcare brand DHL Health Logistics.

BIX 2026 is a biotech and pharmaceutical industry exhibition organized by the Korea Biotechnology Industry Organization and managed by RX Korea. The event runs through Saturday at Hall C on the third floor of COEX, as well as The Platz and conference rooms at the venue.

DHL Express, DHL Global Forwarding and DHL Supply Chain — the company's three domestic divisions — are participating jointly. The divisions are presenting their combined services in international express delivery, large-scale freight transport, and storage and retail distribution to showcase the full range of logistics solutions available to pharmaceutical and biotech companies.

DHL Health Logistics is an integrated brand launched at the group level in April last year. At the time, DHL announced plans to invest a total of 2 billion euros ($2.23 billion) by 2030 to expand its life sciences and healthcare logistics business.

The investment targets include transport and storage facilities for biopharmaceuticals, medical devices, cell and gene therapies, and clinical trial drugs.

DHL tailors its divisional services according to the size and purpose of each shipment.

DHL Express handles small, time-sensitive shipments that arise during the research and development and clinical trial stages. Through its pharmaceutical-focused international express service, Medical Express, the division provides appropriate packaging, international delivery and shipment condition monitoring.

The division also offers a white-glove service in which trained staff visit client sites directly to assist with packaging and cargo pickup, reducing the burden on customers who would otherwise need to package and dispatch pharmaceuticals requiring specialized handling equipment and procedures on their own.

DHL Global Forwarding handles larger shipments, including commercial-stage biopharmaceuticals and active pharmaceutical ingredients.

The division supports international air and maritime transport through its temperature-controlled service Thermonet and its premium service LifeConEx. It also provides pre-shipment risk assessments for temperature deviations and monitors cargo conditions throughout the delivery process.

At the exhibition, the division is presenting temperature requirements for different pharmaceuticals and the corresponding transport methods, drawing on actual shipping cases.

Domestic storage and distribution fall under DHL Supply Chain, which currently operates three healthcare logistics hubs in the Greater Seoul area — in Icheon in Gyeonggi Province, Geomdan in Incheon, and Jangji in Seoul.

These facilities store pharmaceuticals and medical devices at the temperatures required for each product and maintain storage conditions through around-the-clock temperature monitoring.

Beyond storage, the facilities also carry out inventory management, product labeling and packaging. An emergency hospital delivery service is available to ensure medical institutions receive the supplies they need on time.

By linking international transport with domestic storage and delivery, DHL plans to manage logistics operations across multiple stages — from the production facility to the end customer — in an integrated manner.

DHL is also expanding its global healthcare transport network. On Oct. 12, the company announced the addition of six cold-chain air freight routes connecting major pharmaceutical production and research hubs in Asia with the United States and Europe. One of the new routes links Cincinnati with Incheon International Airport.

At the BIX exhibition, DHL is also running a program called "Logistics Prescription," which offers tailored logistics consultations for individual companies. Specialists from all three DHL divisions review each visiting company's product storage temperatures, shipping volumes and delivery routes before recommending the most suitable transport and storage services.

DHL has been expanding its healthcare logistics business in South Korea for some time. DHL Express and DHL Global Forwarding handled the import, export and domestic transport of COVID-19 diagnostic kits and vaccines during the pandemic.

DHL Supply Chain opened a dedicated logistics center in Jangji-dong, Seoul, last year to support the domestic product distribution of a global medical device company, and has been growing its medical device storage and domestic delivery business since then.


kwater@heraldcorp.com