Foundation and diversification Roadway Services Inc. (RSI) was created in 1982 as a holding company by national
less than truckload (LTL) carrier
Roadway Express. Roadway Express was initially RSI's only subsidiary but in 1984 the company acquired short-haul carrier Spartan Express Inc., then specialized truckload carrier Nationwide Carriers Inc., and finally in 1984, it purchased Roberts Express, a same-day critical trucking company, from
Emery Air Freight. With both truckload and LTL services available via its subsidiaries, in 1985 RSI founded a package delivery service,
Roadway Package System (RPS) in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. RPS was intended to out-compete the package delivery services of
UPS by structuring itself for lower costs. At the time, RSI was the third-largest motor freight carrier in the US. In 1993, RSI acquired Southwest regional LTL carrier
Central Freight Lines which it placed in its Roadway Regional Group along with Viking in the West, Viking subsidiary Spartan in the central and southern US and Cole's Express in New England. RSI also expanded into air freight with its 1993 founding of
Roadway Global Air (RGA) based in Indianapolis.
Roadway Express spinoff While RSI's smaller regional carriers were all non-union, Roadway Express was unionized and in April 1994 it was impacted by a nationwide strike of the
Teamsters Union. The strike was the result of a breakdown in negotiations between the Teamsters and Trucking Management Inc., a negotiating group which represented 23 large trucking companies including Roadway Express,
Consolidated Freightways, and
Yellow Freight. In the end, the strike lasted 24 days The strike at Roadway Express highlighted the division's profitability imbalance when compared to RSI's non-union carriers. At the time, Roadway Express contributed over 40% of the parent company's annual revenue
Caliber System In November 1995, Roadway Services announced it was changing its name to
Caliber System, effective in January 1996 and would move its stock listing from the Nasdaq to the NYSE under the new symbol "CBB." It also rebranded Roadway Logistics and Roadway Technology to Caliber Logistics and Caliber Technology, respectively. Caliber immediately began an effort to reorganize in an attempt to decrease costs. In November it shut down RGA and sold the assets to
Burlington Air Express. Caliber said it had lost on the venture. Viking announced a wage freeze in July 1996 and in December said it would be eliminating 30 terminals and 1,500 jobs in a bid to reduce costs. Despite positive performances from RPS, Roberts, and Caliber Logistics in Q1 1997, Caliber announced in March it would be selling or closing a large portion of the eastern operations of Viking leaving it as a west coast-focused carrier. Caliber reported Viking had seen losses of around after having been unable to bring Viking to profitability since merging its smaller, regional carriers into a nationwide offering. The cuts were expected to include 4,000 jobs and 83 terminals in the eastern, southern, and central US. These areas had been primarily served by the former Coles and Spartan subsidiaries. by the newly formed FDX Corp., now
FedEx Corp, a company formed by
Federal Express to serve as a holding company for its express business and its new, Caliber subsidiaries. Following the acquisition, former Caliber subsidiary Roadway Express () took Caliber's place on the Dow Jones Transportation Average. ==Fate of subsidiaries==