Alibaba’s logistics arm Cainiao Network announced a charter deal with Atlas Air as the company looks to drive e-commerce shipments to South America. 

The partnership will see Atlas Air operate three weekly charter flights linking China, Brazil and Chile as Alibaba looks to bank on the growth of cross-border trade between China and Latin America.

Cainiao said that its parcel volume to South America reached over eight million packages in the third quarter of 2020, double the number transported during the second quarter of this year. 

The airfreight charter service will start in November and is expected to shorten the overall shipping time from a week to three days. 

“At Cainiao, we continue to invest in our network to support Alibaba merchants operating over 100,000 online shops,” said William Xiong, Cainiao’s chief strategist and general manager of export logistics. 

“Our partnership with Atlas Air will help us establish an efficient, reliable network to South America and other worldwide destinations by significantly reducing airfreight delivery time for the merchants we support.” 

“We are excited to support Cainiao and Alibaba’s fast-growing e-commerce business and its global expansion in South America, and we look forward to developing our partnership further,” said Atlas Air president and CEO John Dietrich. 

“The global scale of our operating networks will enable Cainiao to continue to enhance its logistics capabilities and meet its objectives to offer customers faster deliveries globally,” he added. 

In August, the Chinese logistics company launched four weekly charter flights between Singapore and Hangzhou in anticipation of rising demand during Alibaba’s Double 11 event. 

Cainiao is expected to operate about 1,300 chartered flights by the end of 2020.