French Startup Convargo is a market for shippers and carriers so you can find a truck and send goods across France more efficiently. The startup has just raised a $ 19 million Series A round led by Inventure Partners and Earlybird.
Tony Fadell, Patrick Sayer and Oskar Hartmann, Roger Crook, Clement Benoit and Romain Afflelou also participate in today's tour.
As always, market startups work particularly well for fragmented industries. And this one is perfect because many carriers own fewer than 10 trucks, prices vary greatly and there has been little innovation in recent decades.
"Today, we have more than 2,000 partners representing more than 120,000 trucks," said co-founder and CEO Maxime Legardez. "Some of our trucking companies only have 2 or 3 trucks while others are national or European trucking companies."
And the company is still quite young because it has been around for a year. Convargo plans to expand to other European countries in 2018. 3,000 companies now use Convargo, including some large clients, such as Auchan.co.uk or Procter & Gamble.
Although there are a handful of startups trying to solve the same problem, like FretLink, Convargo especially wants to convert companies that use old school methods to find a truck. Many businesses still rely on phone calls, emails or even faxes to request a shipment. And obsolete markets like uShip do not cut it anymore.
With Convargo, you can create an account in a few minutes and start searching. It becomes your one stop shop for all your road freight needs. You do not need anything else to find a truck.
The service also gives you a price estimate based on the quantity of goods and the route. Convargo can adjust prices according to supply and demand. It will be cheaper to send pallets from Paris to Lyon than Vannes to Angers.
Finally, Convargo worked on the tracking so that you knew the status of your goods at any time. The service automatically generates delivery forms for transport companies.
When it comes to trucking companies, many companies can not optimize their trucks because drivers often have to drive empty trucks to find the next customer. A market can solve these problems by showing more potential customers.
Convargo is working on API integrations with existing IT systems in the freight industry, optimization of pricing algorithms and more monitoring and scheduling services. This industry is going to be land grabbing. Now let's see who will conquer the European continent first.
Bookseller Image: Martin Barraud / Getty Images