Growth of Intermodal Freight Transportation Sparks Debut of TT’s Top 50 Global Carriers

Intermodal freight is growing in volume and importance as shippers embrace the idea of using multiple modes of transport to move goods around the world.

It’s also the reason Transport Topics is publishing, for the first time, a ranking of the world’s largest freight carriers. The companies on the Top 50 Global Freight Carriers list include truck, rail, air and ocean carriers from 20 countries.

The list includes some familiar names, such as U.S.-based parcel carriers UPS Inc. and FedEx Corp., but also some unfamiliar names, such as China Railways and the national railroad of Ukraine. J.B. Hunt Transport Services is on the list, as are trucking companies YRC Worldwide, Con-way Inc. and Schneider. J.B. Hunt was the first trucking company to convert a large amount of over-the-road freight to rail and remains a dominant player in the intermodal freight market in the United States.

Revenue from freight operations for all of the companies on the Top 50 list is more than $600 billion a year, and total revenue is close to $1 trillion annually.

The list, which was compiled for Transport Topics by SJ Consulting Group in Sewickley, Pennsylvania, includes a description of ownership and a listing of executives, along with data on the number of freight-hauling assets owned or controlled by each company.

The Top 50 Global Freight Carriers is the fourth in a series of lists published by Transport Topics.

The other TT lists are the Top 50 Logistics Companies, published in April, the Top 100 For-Hire Carriers, published in July, and the Top 100 Private Carriers, which is published in August.