If you thought every 18 wheeler you saw driving across the highway was carrying precious cargo, youd be wrong. Many are empty, emitting carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.
Thats the inefficiency and environmental toll that trucking startup is trying to eliminate. The company, which has been called the Uber for Trucking has created a digital freight network matching shipments with carriers.
Convoy raised $400 million in its new round of funding co-led by and funds, the company announced Wednesday.
Subscribe to the 蹤獲弝け Daily
Convoy last raised $185 million in a round led by in September 2018. The new Series D round brings the companys to more than $668 million
In the past year, Convoy has had two major breakthroughs to make trucking in the United States more efficient, Chief Product Officer Ziad Ismail said. The company has been matching 95 percent of trucks in its network with technology, whereas the traditional industry matches trucks to cargo manually–an extremely expensive and less efficient method. Convoy has also been giving truck drivers two or three jobs at a time instead of just one to improve efficiency.
Were not trying to replicate and scale the existing model, were trying to build something thats very different, Ismail said in an interview with 蹤獲弝け News. The new round of funding will help further Convoys matching and efficiency efforts.
The U.S. market for trucking is about $1 trillion, according to Ziad, and theres at least one other high-profile competitor trying to disrupt it: . The company announced in September that it would be investing $200 million annually into growing its Uber Freight operations.
But Ziad said Convoy isnt focusing on Uber Freight or any other competitor. Other players in the space either started off as traditional shippers or acquired one, Ismail said, whereas Convoy has been zeroed in on having an efficient, tech-first, environmentally-friendly model all along.
Were really focused on this mission on transporting the world with zero waste…what weve been able to build with this team really leads the industry, Ismail said.
Generation Investment Management co-led the new Series D round as a new investor after first becoming acquainted with Convoy in 2016, according to Generation partner Joy Tuffield.
This is a space we have researched and looked at for a number of years now, Tuffield said. Convoy was a company that intrigued us.
Generation focuses on sustainable investments, so Convoys mission to reduce carbon dioxide emissions was a good fit.
We are a firm that truly backs one kind of game in town…were kind of putting our full force behind making sure its a success, Tuffield said.
Convoys investors include Greylock Partners, Y Combinator, Salesforce co-CEO Marc Benioff, U2s Bono and The Edge.
Illustration Credit:
Stay up to date with recent funding rounds, acquisitions, and more with the 蹤獲弝け Daily.


67.1K Followers