Bpost (stylised ''bpost''), also known as the Belgian Post Group, is the Belgian company responsible for the delivery of

mail The mail or post is a system for physically transporting postcards, letter (message), letters, and parcel (package), parcels. A postal service can be private or public, though many governments place restrictions on private systems. Since the mid ...

in Belgium. The Belgian Post Group is one of the largest

civilian A civilian is a person who is not a member of an armed force. It is war crime, illegal under the law of armed conflict to target civilians with military attacks, along with numerous other considerations for civilians during times of war. If a civi ...

employers in Belgium. It provides a range of postal,

courier A courier is a person or organization that delivers a message, package or letter from one place or person to another place or person. Typically, a courier provides their courier service on a commercial contract basis; however, some couriers are ...

direct marketing Direct marketing is a form of communicating an offer, where organizations communicate directly to a Target market, pre-selected customer and supply a method for a direct response. Among practitioners, it is also known as ''direct response ...

banking A bank is a financial institution that accepts Deposit account, deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital m ...

insurance Insurance is a means of protection from financial loss in which, in exchange for a fee, a party agrees to compensate another party in the event of a certain loss, damage, or injury. It is a form of risk management, primarily used to protect ...

, and electronic services in a highly competitive European market. The headquarters are located in

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

at the Muntcenter (Bisschopsstraat). Before 2010, it was known as De Post in Dutch and La Poste in French, meaning "the Post" in each case in English.

Ownership

By Royal Decree of 17 March 2000, The Post cast off its status of

autonomous In developmental psychology and moral, political, and bioethical philosophy, autonomy is the capacity to make an informed, uncoerced decision. Autonomous organizations or institutions are independent or self-governing. Autonomy can also be defi ...

public enterprise to adopt the status of a

public In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociology, sociological concept of the ''Öf ...

limited liability Limited liability is a legal status in which a person's financial Legal liability, liability is limited to a fixed sum, most commonly the value of a person's investment in a corporation, company, or joint venture. If a company that provides limi ...

company. Its public service missions are all described that it concluded with the Belgian State. In January 2006,

Post Danmark Post Danmark A/S, trading as PostNord Denmark (), is the national provider of postal services in Denmark. It was established as a fully state-owned stock holder's company in 1995 following political liberalization efforts. Post Danmark had t ...

and

CVC Capital Partners CVC Capital Partners plc is a Jersey-based private equity and investment advisory firm with approximately €186 billion of assets under management and approximately €157 billion in secured commitments since inception across American, European, ...

signed an agreement with the Belgian Government on the acquisition of 50% minus one share in the Belgian Post for €300 million. Post Danmark had been selected by the Belgian Government a partner because it would assist bpost in modernizing the company. The Belgian Government, bpost, Post Danmark and CVC have prepared a joint plan for developing the Belgian Post.

Acquisitions

Certipost is a Belgian electronic communications subsidiary of bpost based in Aalst founded in 2002. They produce solutions to issues with

electronic document An electronic document is a document that can be sent in non-physical means, such as telex, email, and the internet. Originally, any computer data were considered as something internal—the final data output was always on paper. However, the ...

exchange and

archiving An archive is an accumulation of historical records or materials, in any medium, or the physical facility in which they are located. Archives contain primary source documents that have accumulated over the course of an individual or organ ...

including

digital certificate In cryptography, a public key certificate, also known as a digital certificate or identity certificate, is an electronic document used to prove the validity of a public key. The certificate includes the public key and information about it, informa ...

and electronic identity cards. In October 2017, bpost acquired American

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) refers to commercial activities including the electronic buying or selling products and services which are conducted on online platforms or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile co ...

company

Radial, Inc. Radial, Inc. is an American multinational company, multinational e-commerce company based in King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. It provides order management, payment processing, order routing, fulfillment, and analytics services for companies such as ...

for US$820 million.

Controversies

Bpost is accused of having entered into spurious contracts with the Belgian Government, overstating costs for delivering newspapers to receive elevated subsidies and a host of other allegedly fraudulent operations. In April 2023 Bpost was forced to admit it had broken European competition rules and had overcharged by tens of millions of Euros amid reports of secret deals between the company and the Belgian state. In total, Bpost is said to have received €4 billion in public spending between 2013 and 2023. According to journalists, most of these subsidies and fees are questionable and are the result of close ties between the Belgian state and the company. Bpost use monopoly power to allegedly make questionable price-fixing agreements with publishers DPG media and Mediahuis, as was revealed by an internal audit in 2023. In August 2023, Kathleen Van Beveren, chief executive of E-logistics Eurasia at Bpost and a member of its executive committee, stepped down from her role amid accusations of fraud and foul play inside the company.

References

External links

* * Communications in Belgium Companies based in Brussels Companies listed on Euronext Brussels Private equity portfolio companies CVC Capital Partners companies Belg Postal system of Belgium Government-owned companies of Belgium {{Belgium-company-stub