AMSTERDAM—TNT N.V. has agreed to sell its TNT Logistics division to Apollo Management L.P., a private-equity firm, for approximately $1.9 billion. The sale, which is expected to be completed by year’s end, is the latest in a series of deals involving international third-party logistics (3PL) service providers.

TNT put its logistics unit up for sale in December with the intention of simplifying its organizational structure and focusing on its core mail and courier businesses, including European Mail Networks (EMN) and Mail Netherlands. Once the sale becomes official, TNT Logistics Group Managing Director and North America CEO David Kulik will resign from TNT to become CEO of the new company. A new name and brand identity is now under development.

Kulik said the sale is something that TNT had been working toward for more than eight months. All of TNT Logistics’ 11 business units will remain intact, and its non-logistics groups will continue to conduct business as usual, Kulik said.

“What you will see with the new TNT Logistics is a global logistics company with an integrated service offering,” said Kulik. “So, whether a customer is in Shanghai or San Francisco, it will receive the same consistent service anywhere in the world.” TNT Logistics currently has about 1,000 customers for which it provides “closed network” contract services, including transportation, warehousing services, and manufacturing. These provide dedicated equipment, facilities, and services that are tailored to specific customers’ needs. The company’s core mail and TNT Express divisions, by contrast, offer an open environment with multiple services for many customers, Kulik said.

The TNT Logistics sell-off differs from other recent deals involving contract-logistics companies. Ben Gordon, managing partner of BG Strategic Advisors, a merger and acquisition consultancy, notes that previous mergers and buyouts were designed to bring complementary services together with the aim of integrating them into a single, multi-faceted whole.

In this case, though, there’s a different objective: “No synergies are gained in the sale to a private-equity buyer,” said Gordon. “Apollo does not provide additional locations, customers, or services. What they provide is capital for growth.”

How the sale will effect TNT Logistics’ customers remains to be seen. Kulik expects little change; TNT Logistics was operated as a separate business, with its own staff, facilities, and customers, so there should be no disruptions resulting from the change in ownership, he said. But private-equity firms do deals to make money, so shippers may wonder how much Apollo Management will invest in the business, suggests Adrian Gonzalez, director of the Logistics Executive Council at ARC Advisory Services.

The separation of some of TNT’s services is a potential negative for some shippers. “This sale is splitting apart TNT’s freight forwarding operations from its contract logistics operations,” observes Evan Armstrong, president of the consulting firm Armstrong and Associates Inc. “For a domestic U.S. company or a company that is doing warehousing in the U.S. or Europe, this [sale] may be a positive,” he said. “But if you need some type of freight forwarding … and you were using TNT before, it may be a big question mark right now.”