Dutch startup Travis secures €5M to make road service management seamless for providers and fleet owners

Netherlands-based Travis Road Services, a startup that allows carriers to find, book, and pay for road services such as truck wash, tank cleaning, truck parking and repairs, announced that it has raised €5M in a fresh round of funding.

The round saw investment from Wil Versteijnen, Brabantse Ontwikkelings Maatschappij (BOM), and Shell Ventures – the corporate venture capital arm of Royal Dutch Shell plc. The proceeds from this round will help the company to further accelerate its growth in more European countries.

Data-driven road services

Founded in 2018 by Dennis van Veggel, Travis was founded to solve the inefficient and costly administrative process of finding, booking and paying for road services. Its booking platform connects fleet owners with local road service providers across Europe.

Over 1,100 road service locations have been connected and over 250,000 unique vehicles are currently registered and using the Travis platform. The company is active in 17 countries and plans to further cover Europe within the next few years.

According to Dennis van Veggel, “The road transport sector is changing considerably. There is a rapid increase in the focus on sustainability and digitisation, as a result of which transport companies and their freight movements will look different. In order to remain relevant and competitive, I believe that carriers will constantly have to work on making their systems and processes smarter.

“Digitisation of their road services is also a must and that’s what Travis offers. Due to our vast European road service network accessible via the Travis platform, fleet owners can optimise their planning to gain control and with that reduce costs, detour mileage, and idle time,” adds Veggel.

Apart from a booking platform, Travis also offers hauliers and carriers different tools to efficiently plan their road service use. Ultimately, Travis aims to contribute to a more  cost-effective, efficient, and safe logistics industry.

Story behind investment from Wil Versteijnen

Director of GVT Transport & Logistics, Wil Versteijnen, started working with Travis a long time ago and was actually Travis’ first customer.

Versteijnen explains, “Travis’ online platform enables us to take a flexible approach to the cleaning of our fleet’s vehicles. The combination of a big service network and their online monitoring tools results in more transparency, both for us and our customers. Moreover, all transactions made within the Travis network are automatically combined on one collective invoice. Altogether, the platform helps us to work smarter and to optimise where possible.”

“Platforms like Travis’ are the future, I believe that the industry will digitise at a fast pace. There is so much potential in solutions like the Travis platform, that’s why it was a logical step to  become an investor as well,” adds Versteijnen.