Orian After Hellmann: is the new network already replacing the economics lost with DBSCHENKER?

What This Follow-Up Is Actually Testing

The main article already argued that the move from DBSCHENKER to Hellmann did not leave Orian without an international network. This follow-up asks a narrower question: is the new network already replacing the lost economics, or is it still mostly replacing access to capacity and endpoints?

As of year-end 2025, the answer is only partly yes. Orian clearly looks operationally prepared: the DBSCHENKER agreement ended on July 31, 2025, the Hellmann framework took effect on January 1, 2025, and management says the company completed its readiness for the end of the old relationship. But that same year does not yet provide full commercial proof. Hellmann is already visible on the side where Orian buys network services, especially in import. On the side where the network should start sending business and receipts back to Orian, the evidence is still thin.

That distinction matters. The investor presentation highlights a large global partner: more than 14,000 employees, roughly 250 branches, presence in more than 55 countries, about EUR 3.5 billion of turnover and 20 million shipments in 2023. That answers the scale question. It does not answer the economics question.

What Was Actually Lost With DBSCHENKER

The annual report makes one distinction here that matters more than anything else.

The first customer group was made up of international customers that contracted directly with DBSCHENKER, while Orian provided the local service in Israel. Once the relationship ended, Orian stopped serving most of those customers, except for a few. That is the layer that disappeared.

The second group was made up of customers that contracted directly with Orian, while DBSCHENKER handled the shipments in the origin or destination countries. Here the picture is different: most of those customers stayed with Orian, and the company continued serving them through Hellmann and other international agents.

That is the core point. What Orian preserved was the customer relationship it already owned. What it lost was the stream of customers that came through the DBSCHENKER network itself. So Hellmann should not be judged only on whether Orian kept operating. It should be judged on whether Hellmann is already sending meaningful volume and receipts back to Orian through its own network.

Management also quantifies the size of that hole. It estimates that the end of DBSCHENKER reduced 2025 import-segment revenue by about 8% and export-segment revenue by about 10%. On a full-year activity basis, the direct effect is estimated at roughly 18% of import activity and 15% of export activity. This is not a small missing layer. It is a material part of the business that had to be rebuilt.

Where The Operating Bridge Already Exists

Structurally, Hellmann does look like a real replacement network. The agreement that took effect on January 1, 2025 is a non-exclusive strategic cooperation framework for mutual agency in air and sea freight and additional logistics services. Each side is supposed to promote and market the other side’s services and work jointly to expand activity. The settlement mechanism also looks very similar to the old DBSCHENKER arrangement: a 50% split of profit or loss, and an equal split among the three parties in third-country shipments.

That point matters because it removes one easy explanation. This does not look like a weaker contract formula story. On its face, the economic architecture is similar. If the economics have not returned, the more likely explanation is that reciprocal volume and customer feed have not yet returned to the old level, not that the new contract is inferior on paper.

There is another sign that the operating shift really happened. During December 2024 through February 2025 the company implemented updated interfaces with Hellmann at costs that were not material. In addition, as of the report date, management says the company is prepared to continue providing international freight services to its customers in both import and export. So the continuity question no longer looks like the active bottleneck.

But there is also an important qualifier. As of the report date, the two sides were still discussing a more detailed agreement, while the binding cooperation framework remained in force until such an agreement would be signed. In plain language, the relationship is working, but it still does not look fully institutionalized.

Where The Economics Still Have Not Been Rebuilt

The most revealing numbers are not just segment revenue. They are the settlement flows between Orian and the international network.

That chart isolates the issue better than any slogan can. Hellmann is already visible on the side where Orian buys network services. In import, payments to Hellmann reached NIS 58.5 million in 2025. In export, payments reached NIS 4.7 million. So the company is already using the new network in a meaningful way.

But on the other side, the receipts Orian received from Hellmann in 2025 were only about NIS 175 thousand in import and NIS 1.8 million in export. For comparison, in 2024 Orian received NIS 9.4 million from DBSCHENKER in import and NIS 22.9 million in export. Even in the transition year itself, 2025, the receipts that still came from DBSCHENKER were NIS 4.7 million in import and NIS 6.7 million in export.

That is strong evidence that the new network is currently replacing operating access more than it is replacing the old reciprocal economics. Orian is already buying capacity and services through Hellmann. It is not yet receiving a comparable stream of business and receipts back from Hellmann.

One caution matters here. Not everything in 2025 should be blamed on the network transition itself. Air and sea freight rates fell, import air activity weakened, export activity and pricing both softened, and the dollar weakened. All of that hurt revenue and profitability even without a direct Hellmann effect. But those factors do not explain why return flows from the new network remained so small. That is a more direct read on whether Hellmann is merely giving Orian access, or already feeding Orian business.

What The Freight Segments Say

In import, revenue fell 4% to NIS 423.6 million, but gross profit fell 26% to NIS 37.7 million and gross margin fell from 12% to 9%. The fourth quarter was worse still: revenue fell 25% and gross profit fell 40%.

In export, revenue fell 13% to NIS 152.1 million, gross profit fell 25% to NIS 27.9 million, and gross margin fell from 21% to 18%. Here too the fourth quarter was weaker: revenue was down 34% and gross profit was down 51%.

Management itself lists the reasons: lower freight prices, lower activity in some lanes, a weaker dollar, and the end of DBSCHENKER. Export also has one additional nuance that matters: 2025 segment revenue was helped by income recorded from the closing settlement with DBSCHENKER at the end of the relationship. In other words, even with that transition cushion, the segment still weakened.

The read is fairly clear. If Hellmann were already replacing not only the network but also the economics that were lost, the first thing one would expect to see is at least an early repair in gross margins, or at a minimum much more meaningful return-side receipts. By year-end 2025, that signal is still missing.

What Hellmann Already Proves, And What Is Still Open

Hellmann does prove that Orian has a network to work with. It proves the company was not left dependent on a system that disappeared. It proves there is now a partner with global reach, brand, systems, and operating capability. In that sense, calling the transition an operating failure would go too far.

But that is still not the same as saying the economics have returned. To say that, four things still need to happen and this report does not yet show them:

1. A material rise in receipts that Orian receives from Hellmann, especially in import.
2. Evidence that new international customers are being sourced through the new network, not only that Orian is preserving customers it already owned.
3. A stop to the gross-margin erosion in import and export, especially after the weak fourth quarter.
4. A move from a working relationship to a deeper commercial framework, if and when the detailed agreement is signed.

Put differently, the real question is not whether Hellmann already replaces DBSCHENKER as a network-services provider. It does. The real question is whether Hellmann already replaces DBSCHENKER as a source of business feed and receipts. The 2025 evidence does not support that conclusion yet.

Conclusion

By year-end 2025, the Hellmann transition looks like successful defensive execution, not proof that the economic engine lost with DBSCHENKER has already been rebuilt. Orian preserved continuity, retained most of the customers it owned directly, and secured a new international network. That is a real operating achievement.

But the commercial proof is still weak. Receipts flowing back from Hellmann to Orian in 2025 remain very small compared with what DBSCHENKER used to generate, and both freight segments still ended the year with sharp profitability erosion, which became worse in the fourth quarter. So the best read at year-end 2025 is that Hellmann already replaces the network, but not yet the lost economics.