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A $27 million-plus nuclear verdict against UPS handed down in 2019 has been overturned by a Texas appellate court and remanded to the trial court with a requirement for a venue change.

The original case was heard in the Texas 58th District Court in Jefferson County. But the order handed down Thursday by Judge Charles Kreger of the Texas 9th Court of Appeals remands the case to Harris County, Texas, home of the city of Houston.

UPS and Byron Bisor, the driver from the 2018 wreck that was at the heart of the case, argued that the suit should not have been heard in Jefferson County, where the $27 million verdict was imposed. That verdict came from a bench trial, with Judge Kent Walston imposing the penalties.

Neither Harris County nor Jefferson County is where the wreck occurred; they’re not even in the same state. The wreck occurred in 2018 in Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, on Interstate 10.

Experience UPS innovations at this year’s greatest show at the world’s fair

Expo 2020 Dubai is expected to attract millions of visitors from more than 190 countries when it opens to the public Oct. 1. The world’s fair was delayed a year but is moving forward with extra safety protocols in place to highlight how the world has adapted to change and innovated despite COVID-19 challenges.

Years of planning and construction have gone into the world’s fair, to showcase collaboration and creativity from around the globe.

Here are three ways UPS, as the Official Logistics Partner, will demonstrate its commitment to innovation and deliver one of the most sustainable expos in history:

1. A virtual platform provides an immersive, 3D experience demonstrating what the logistics of the future will look like. Guests will move around freely and interact with a variety of different UPS-related exhibits. Click here to check out the HIVE by UPS.
2. Operation of electrically assisted cycles and two Arrival vehicle prototypes onsite. These alternative fuel vehicles will enhance each visitor’s experience at the expo with improved air quality and reduced emissions, and show how UPS is advancing sustainable delivery solutions.
3. Every package shipped at the UPS Expo 2020 customer counters will be carbon free with UPS purchasing carbon offsets for each shipment to mitigate its environmental impacts.

You could think of Amazon as UPS’s classic frenemy.

When the pandemic erupted last spring, few businesses were more essential than the United Parcel Service. As the world’s largest small-package delivery company, UPS and its iconic brown trucks kept the world spinning by materializing fresh groceries, trendy exercise bikes, webcams and microphones, and hand-stitched face masks on the doorsteps of the home-bound billions. In a recent conversation for the Fast Company Innovation Festival, editor-in-chief Stephanie Mehta sat down with Carol Tomé, who joined UPS as CEO in June 2020, to discuss how the 114-year-old company was able to stay nimble during the COVID-19 crisis, and how the historic challenges of the past year could usher in an era of change for the legacy courier.

On culture and getting hip

UPS made headlines last year for a 21st-century policy shakeup that relaxed rules prohibiting beards, long hair on men, facial piercings, and tattoos, a move overseen by Tomé. “To be an employer of choice,” says Tomé, “we want UPSers to bring their real, authentic selves to work. They should be able to bring facial hair or natural hair.” The former tattoo rule, Tomé adds, was “more restrictive than the U.S. Army . . . In the summertime, it gets hot, and our UPSers still had to cover up their tats! Way too uncomfortable, so we took care of that.”

As we head into fall, there couldn’t be a better time to start planning for the holidays.

Here’s what you need to know about holiday shopping, buying and shipping ahead of the season.

What UPS is doing

Our focus is on three key things:

1) Flexing our network in preparation for the volume surge.
2) Planning carefully, in close collaboration with our customers.
3) Continuing to move our world forward by delivering what matters – including vaccines and new job opportunities across our company.

We’re preparing to make this one of the most successful holiday shipping seasons ever. That starts with reliable, on-time delivery. Last peak shipping season, UPS led the industry for overall on-time performance. And we are ready to deliver that this season again.

Key Points

• UPS is buying crowd-source delivery leader Roadie for an undisclosed sum.
• The deal gives UPS immediate national scale in delivering non-traditional packages.
• Roadie allows UPS to confront the threat posed by Amazon entering third-party delivery.

UPS finally filled a gaping hole in its business, one that allows the courier to expand beyond just delivering packages. Big Brown announced it was acquiring Roadie, a crowd-sourced same-day delivery company that gives UPS a big boost in staying competitive.

It’s a timely purchase as we head into the holiday shopping season, with analysts expecting robust Christmas sales, meaning more package deliveries. But it’s also anticipated that local same-day deliveries typically beyond UPS capabilities (meaning goods often not shipped in boxes) will also grow, and Roadie now provides the courier with the chance to get into that space, too.