Supply Chain as a Strategic Weapon: Toll’s Defence Push Goes Global

Main image: Toll provides integrated logistics solutions to customers globally, with a division focused on the mission of Defence agencies.

Global tensions are reshaping military priorities, and logistics have become a decisive edge in defence strategy. Toll’s Government & Defence business is stepping up to meet that demand with its Theatre Supply Chain division — a capability designed to deliver elite strategic and operational logistics wherever defence organisations need to deploy. 

We spoke with Steve Roughsedge, Senior Vice President of Toll Theatre Supply Chain, about the company’s growing international footprint, and how Toll is helping its clients prepare for the next decade of defence readiness.

From a geostrategic point-of-view, there are emerging military risks in Europe, in the middle east, and in Asia. As a result of that, a global arms race has commenced with enormous funding going into defence creating a massive opportunity for defence focused businesses to expand their operations.

Defence agencies around the world rely heavily on commercial service providers to enable their operations, and even more so when the potential operational theatres are a long way from home. When defence spending surges on expanded capabilities, this creates opportunities for Tier one logistics solution providers like us to provide broader ranges of support in areas of relevance to our customers. In response we've opened offices in the Philippines, the US, and in the UK to directly access such opportunities.

Over recent years the western alliance has identified an accelerating risk to regional stability from the unexplained military build of the People’s Republic of China. Defence leaders have identified the complexity of responding to military challenges in the region, and note that China has a home ground advantage. Enablement of significant military capability in the IndoPacific is all about logistics. How do forces get there? Where do they deploy? How do they manoeuvre? And how do they deliver resilient combat effects for sustained periods? The Chinese have built a massive force and offensive capability that's only getting bigger.

So, what to do? What you do is ensure access to existing  infrastructure, assets and capabilities, and supplement with new. Preparedness timeframes would seem to constrain the ability to reverse this sequence. Those capabilities, infrastructure and assets include boats, warehouses, ports, transport services, aviation, expeditionary support – all the things Toll does at scale right throughout Asia.

Contingency and Sustainment carried meaning pertinent to a fading time in the geostrategic environment. Our customers are large government agencies whose views are broad and whose demand for capability are more extensive. To align with our customers’ needs, we redefined our division in terms of what we do: build and deliver supply chains, and where we do that:  anywhere that a defence agency needs to operate. The message we're trying to get across is that we're an organisation who is postured towards providing supply chains to military operations in their selected theatres. It says, “If you want to go and operate somewhere, we'll build and deliver the supply chains you need to be effective.”. 

I think the name change has helped. When we're at trade shows and we're talking to defence personnel, they instantly understand what we're talking about.  

The way to think of it is that we bring the totality of Toll's capabilities to our primary customers: The Australian Defence Force, New Zealand Defence Force, US DoD, the UK MoD, the United Nations, other government agencies and quasi-government agencies. 

Our secret sauce is our ability to harness all the different capabilities inherent across the Toll organisation and bring them together into tailored solutions that achieve the desired effects our specific customers are seeking. 

If we look at all of the logistics required to support a defence operation anywhere, we've either done it or we’re doing it today – there's nothing that defence can throw at us that we don't know how to do.   

We'll build a tailored solution based on value chains built using  capability bricks from across our global business, and where it makes sense, we'll bring in specialist capability providers that drive efficiency or grant access to particular capabilities and geography. It doesn't matter what it is our customers need to do, whether it's looking after a navy vessel that comes into port, moving heavy military assets internationally, moving and storing explosive ordnance or providing core logistics services such as warehousing and national distribution, we have the relevant expertise, and past performance. We run airports and ports, provide maritime support services to large fleets and have particular expertise in fuel. There is literally nothing in the logistics supply chain needs of a Defence focused agency that we can't do and can't deliver. That's what we bring to the table.

Anywhere. Anytime. Download the Toll Government and Defence Capability Brochure.

The UK market is surprisingly different to the US, it has greater similarity to the Australian defence market in how they structure– which makes it a natural fit. The UK is a very comfortable place for an Australian organisation to do business, not just from a business level, but also at the cultural level with the relationships you develop. There are a couple of substantial opportunities emerging to provide large scale support to the UK Ministry of Defence, where we believe we add considerable value. Such programs would also provide a footprint for us to bring extend our capabilities and strategies into the European marketplace. 

The ability to play a role in supporting the defence of our nation and our allies is always a compelling prospect, so the ability to deploy our existing capabilities to achieve this genuinely exciting. We've extended our presence to include an office within the highly strategic Subic Bay in the Philippines as a preemptive presence in that marketplace, and to provide support to allied forces that will be operating in that part of the world on an increasing basis, even in peacetime. We also have several significant programs underway that will  swing the dial for our company’s ability to deepen the support we already provide in the region. We will have more to say on those matters in the next couple of months. 

Learn more about how Toll's customised and integrated logistics solutions are helping to prepare for the next decade of defence readiness, by reaching out for a chat at tollgroup-government-defence-enquiry.