FreightHub, Europe’s first digital freight forwarder has raised USD 30 million (around €27 million ) in its Series B financing round. Rider Global, a venture fund founded by logistics experts, took the lead in this funding round and was welcomed as new investor together with Maersk Growth, the corporate venture arm of A.P. Moller‐Maersk – the world’s largest container shipping company.
Existing investors Northzone, Global Founders Capital (GFC) and Cherry Ventures also took part. London based investment firm Unbound, founded by Shravin Mittal and focused on deploying long term capital in industry changing tech companies, significantly expanded its stake.
“Our recent growth trajectory has confirmed the potential that our digital solutions can realize for both our customers and FreightHub’s internal processes. We will use the fresh capital to further develop our digital service offering and to expand our presence in Asia,” explained founder and CEO Ferry Heilemann. “With Maersk Growth, we have onboarded a new investor that offers extensive strategic insight and allows for mutual collaboration opportunities.” Ferry Heilemann co‐founded the company in 2016 together with Erik Muttersbach (CTO), Michael Wax (CCO) and Dr. Fabian Heilemann, who currently serves as Chairman of the Shareholders’ Advisory Board. Dr. Michael Ardelt (COO) joined the company in 2017.
“FreightHub is a well‐run company with a promising technology in the digital freight forwarder segment. This makes it a great fit with Maersk Growth’s investment strategy which aims to explore and mature promising technologies with a potential to improve supply chain management and customer experience,” said Jeppe Høier, Partner at Maersk Growth. “As a digital leader in container logistics, we believe in cooperation and learning experiences across the digital ecosystem of our industry. We look forward to accompanying FreightHub in further developing as digital freight forwarder and believe our cooperation can help both companies build on their capabilities and offerings to the benefit of existing and new customers in the SME segment.”
Timur Boridko, managing partner of Rider Global, emphasized: “As a fund with a deep focus on logistics, we can note that the company is in a favorable position among its competitors. Well‐built business processes, coupled with good IT, are the key to success in building a rapidly developing disruptor in a complex industry. We believe in the team and are confident that the company will become the market leader in the near future.”
New digital solutions and offices
As a fully‐fledged freight forwarder, FreightHub offers transport services for sea, air and rail freight, built on digitized processes – from booking, communication, data exchange and document management to supply chain optimization. Qualified and up‐to‐date data provide the basis and create the necessary transparency to simplify the entire process and to increase efficiency.
Last year, FreightHub invested heavily in solutions for digital collaboration among customers, partners and suppliers and expanded the interface functions for its system integration capabilities. Moreover, the company expanded its service portfolio, e.g., through the newly obtained IATA license for air freight services. “Our forwarding solution offers more transparency, reliability and ultimately time and cost advantages for large and mid‐sized organisations. Today, we serve some of the most renowned German brands and tripled our year over year volume,” explained CCO Michael Wax.
More than 1,500 customers – including well‐known companies such as Home24, Miele and Viessmann – now rely on FreightHub’s services. In addition to existing locations in Berlin and Hamburg, the company opened its first Asian office in Hong Kong and acquired a sea freight forwarder specialised in Asian imports.
Further technology investments and expansion in Asia
“What sets us apart in particular is the combination of experienced logistics experts, data‐driven and therefore robust processes as well as state‐of‐the‐art technology,” emphasized CTO Erik Muttersbach. “So as to open up further control and optimization options for our customers on their way to a data‐ based supply chain, we will continue to invest heavily in the development of new features, such as complete planning and control of orders at product level.” FreightHub is already in a position to leverage the platform data for automated detection of deviations and proactive notification of customers.
In addition to technological investments, FreightHub plans to expand its Asia operation. “The aim is to expand our existing network and provide a broader range of complex logistics services. A stronger presence in Asia will allow us to handle the processes on site independently and thus enable us to offer our customers a seamless end‐to‐end process,” said COO Dr. Michael Ardelt.
FreightHub was founded in Berlin in 2016 by Ferry Heilemann (CEO), Erik Muttersbach (CTO), Michael Wax (CCO) and Dr. Fabian Heilemann (Chairman of the Advisory Board). As a fully‐fledged freight forwarder, FreightHub offers forwarding services for sea, air and rail freight. The company relies on digital planning and processing. With real‐time data, offer transparency and full control of the supply chain, the company can convince more and more customers of the advantages of digitalization. The company has branches in Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne, Porto and Hong Kong and currently employs 150 people.
— Press Release
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