This partly explains why Belgium-based startup Qargo has now raised £11 million ($14 million) in a Series A round led by Balderton Capital.
With the logistics industry facing rising operating costs, decarbonization pressures, hikes in fuel prices and cyber attacks, companies in the space are in tricky times.
There is clear pressure to digitize the industry to introduce cost savings.
While the transport industry does use legacy software platforms like Mcleod Software, Rose Rocket and Dash Doc, many of these platforms are from an earlier era.
In a statement, Rob Moffat, partner at Balderton Capital, said, “Logistics is a $5T market globally but is often overlooked by software companies.
Uzum, an e-commerce startup offering online shopping, fintech and food deliveries to millions of customers in Uzbekistan, has raised $114 million in funding, becoming the country’s first unicorn with a valuation of $1.16 billion.
Fintech startups dominated the market with a 30% share, followed by e-commerce startups at 27%, according to estimates (PDF) by the Asian Development Bank.
“We want to expand the products, enhance the infrastructure of our e-commerce, and fund our fintech,” Djumaev said.
By the end of this year, Uzum plans to combine all its businesses into two super apps: one for its consumer-focused offerings, and another for its business-focused products.
However, he doesn’t see any competition in Uzbekistan, as Uzum has the advantage of enjoying different margins across products, and can make higher margins by combining its e-commerce and fintech services.
Save for fintech and cleantech, B2B e-commerce and retail was the leading destination for venture capital dollars over the last five years.
Most B2B e-commerce startups have struggled to keep subsidizing their products and expanding operations, leading to retreats, closures, downsizing and mergers.
Building a B2B e-commerce business in tech winterB2B e-commerce platforms provide convenience to FMCG manufacturers like Unilever and P&G for distributing their products to the last mile.
As a result, many B2B e-commerce startups have opted for asset-heavy models to reach their customer base.
The Lagos-based B2B e-commerce startup is currently in the middle of securing a new round of equity and debt to propel its expansion.
Shadowfax, one of the largest logistics service providers to hyper-local and on-demand delivery businesses in India, has raised $100 million in a new funding round as it clocks an yearly growth of 35%.
Shadowfax says it makes over 2 million packages delivery each day and has amassed over 3.5 million registered users.
Shadowfax operates a logistics and delivery network of over 125,000 monthly active delivery personnels, and works with numerous firms including Flipkart, Meesho and many direct-to-consumer brands.
Shadowfax is Mirae Asset’s first investment in India and the venture firm has participated in each subsequent round.
“We believe that logistics is fundamental to ecommerce and hyperlocal commerce and that it enables the growth of these markets.
TechTaka, a South Korean online shopping fulfillment startup that provides third-party logistics services for e-commerce sellers, has raised $9.5 million (12.6 billion KRW) in a Series B round of funding from a sole investor, Altos Ventures.
The outfit helps e-commerce sellers manage the supply chain, from warehousing, order packing and shipping, so that TechTaka users can focus on product and marketing.
His expertise and interests in logistics and optimization led him to start TechTaka to offer quick and reliable logistics services.
(Coupang has its own fulfillment centers, and Naver bolsters its fulfillment service in collaboration with logistics and fulfillment companies like TechTaka.)
“We tested our service in the U.S. by introducing Korean e-commerce sellers to Amazon, starting in May 2023,” Kim said.
Flexport, a logistics company with $2.7 billion in venture and debt funding, is reportedly planning additional layoffs.
Flexport, which provides freight forwarding and brokerage services, announced similar cuts in October, when founder Ryan Petersen returned as CEO and slashed the company’s workforce by 20% — affecting about 600 workers.
An additional round of layoffs at Flexport would cap a brutal January for tech workers, as giants and startups alike have eliminated a combined tens of thousands of jobs across the industry.
While San Francisco-based Flexport wouldn’t be an outlier for making cuts, the timing would be peculiar.
Just last week, Flexport said it’d raised an additional $260 million in funding from Shopify.
D-Orbit, an Italian startup that provides an array of logistics services for companies operating satellites and other services in space, has raised €100 million ($110 million) in a Series C round of equity funding.
The Milan-based company said another $50 million will be added to the Series C in the first half of this year.
D-Orbit today provides last-mile satellite delivery and related logistics services, mission control as a service to manage already-launched spacecraft and hardware, and space waste management services, all aimed at launches that are orbiting the Earth.
Others in the area of space services include Planet Labs, Privateer, Zenno Astronautics, Astroscale, and a variety of others just getting started.
“D-Orbit represents an excellence that in these years has positioned itself as a category leader in the in-orbit transportation segment globally, becoming the first B-Corp certified space company in the world.”
In Orbit Aerospace wants to be the third party logistics provider for science and industryTwo year old space startup In Orbit Aerospace wants to be the third party logistics provider for Earth to space commerce – and to get there, the company just closed a new agreement to validate key technical capabilities on the International Space Station.
The El Segundo, California-based company is developing orbital platforms and re-entry vehicles to enable mass manufacturing and research in space.
“Automation and robotics is the backbone of industrial manufacturing on Earth,” CEO Ryan Elliott said in a statement.
On a slightly longer scale, In Orbit is aiming to launch a second mission in 2026 and then partner with a spacecraft provider to host a manufacturing lab on orbit.
In Orbit is expecting that its core customers will be manufacturers, who will want to outsource on orbit hosting.
Fez Delivery, a Lagos-based last-mile logistics startup, has raised $1 million in funding from pan-African investor Ventures Platform with participation from Voltron Capital, Acasia Ventures and other angel investors. The…
Quite a few mobility startups, such as Drive.ai and Moovit, have made their names in the industry with app-based platforms that allow customers to find and book transportation services on…
