HONG KONG, Sept 18 (Reuters) - TNT NV, Europe's second-largest global express delivery company, sees encouraging signs in the air freight market, and believes that the time is right to expand in the Asia Pacific, regional managing director James McCormac said.
The Dutch delivery service firm picked Hong Kong as its South China hub for the launch on Friday of its Boeing 747-400 freighter direct service to its European hub in Liege, Belgium three times a week as part of its global expansion.
"Customers will continue to grow. We think it's a good time (to expand) because that's in line with our strategy. We don't think that we should be waiting until late next year when the market has supposedly fully recovered from the crisis," Asia Pacific McCormac told Reuters in an interview before the launch.
TNT reported core profit for the second quarter of this year fell 45 percent, its fourth consecutive year-on-year decline. The company boosted its cost savings target to cope with weaker demand for delivery services.

(Reporting by Nerilyn Tenorio and Joanne Chiu; Editing by Jacqueline Wong)

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