Trucksters raises 6 million euros adds Glovo co-founder director - The startup logistics Spanish Trucksters, dedicated to optimizing the transportation of goods from long distance with its system of relays, just closed a new financing round in which it has raised € 6.3 million and plans to strengthen the european expansion of its business through new corridors between countries and to strengthen its operations in the countries in which it is already present.

In particular, the round has been led by Kibo Ventures and several of its current investors have participated in it, such as The Valley Venture Capital, Big Sur Ventures and Metavallon Venture Capital and APX, the joint venture of Axel Springer and Porsche. The co-founder of Glovo, Sacha Michaud, who joins the board of directors of the startup, and other funds such as Bonsai Partners or Amplifier, specialized in the logistics sector, have also joined.

Trucksters raises 6 million euros adds Glovo co-founder director

"The idea is to reach 50% of the European market and double the number of brokers. The first step will be to join the path Belgium - Germany with Italy," he assured the CEO and co-founder of Trucksters Luis Bardají to Expansion, which highlights that the capital raised in the round will be dedicated to the launch 3 new international corridors and to establish itself in 6 european markets in which it is currently present.

Trucksters seeks to consolidate in Spain, France, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Poland. 9 months ago, after the close of its previous round, Bardají assured that the startup sought to strengthen its Mediterranean corridor, which explained that it started from the Spanish coast to Belgium, Holland and western Germany", and the central corridor, which goes from central Spain to the Benelux countries, and focus "on expanding its presence gradually" in Poland and other central and eastern European countries.

Trucksters raises 6 million euros adds Glovo co-founder director

Trucksters has announced that in this last year of internationalization of their operations have succeeded in displacing 2,000 lorries in its network of brokers to its more than 500 customers, including Seur, Campofrío, Damm, or Kimberly Clark, according to the economic daily, which ensures that the startup intends to double template thanks to this round, moving from its current 30 employees to 60 before 2022.

Precisely, one of its co-founders, Gabor Balogh, recognized recently that his company aims to increase a template to strengthen their process of internationalisation, envisaging opening soon other new international delegation in a european country, who will join his co-workers in Greece, the Netherlands, Belgium and Hungary, and to the reinforcement of their brokers.

Trucksters raises 6 million euros adds Glovo co-founder director

"We are now very focused on our international expansion and are mainly looking for different profiles for positions in operations, technology and sales," Balogh said, highlighting the flexible Trucksters model as one of the secrets of its success. "Currently, we follow a hybrid model of teleworking and face-to-face, being very flexible with our team," he said.

"We believe that startups have to lead this transformation of the work system, which is more technological and efficient than ever." This model allows us to successfully incorporate collaborators in different parts of the world. We will continue to add the best professionals, as we want the best talent with us," added Gabor Balogh.

In addition, Trucksters has announced that it will hire 40 employees for a new hub that will open in A Coruña, which will be added to its headquarters in Madrid and its delegation in Valencia. With this round, Trucksters already accumulates 7.4 million euros raised in its 3 years of activity, in which it has developed a relay system based on artificial intelligence and big data and that will orbit towards autonomous driving and the electrification of long-distance routes, according to Expansión.

Trucksters raises 6 million euros adds Glovo co-founder director

More news:

The 2 technologies that have revolutionized the management of stock at Inditex: why SINT and RFID programs are crucial for the future of the owner of Zara

"5 years ago this would have been impossible," said Pablo Isla, president of Inditex, during the analyst conference after the presentation of the results of the fiscal year 2020, last March. He did so to refer to the unprecedented strategic transformation the group had undertaken in 2018 and was beginning to bear fruit. Much of this digital advance responds to 2 acronyms: RFID and SINT.

A few weeks ago, the CEO of the owner of Zara once again emphasized the role of both technologies and, more specifically, the SINT. It was no wonder: the integrated inventory management program had made it possible to distribute 46 million deliveries from physical points of sale, which had contributed to generating about 1,156 million euros through the online channel. And all in a year in which turnover fell by 27.9%, falling back to the level of 5 years ago.

It is an integrated inventory management system that is currently available in 5,777 stores spread over 89 markets of the 6,758 points that the group had at the end of April. Specifically, the technology allows customers to receive their orders from both store inventory and online, which is achieved faster delivery times.

To find the origin and reason of this technology, you have to go back to 2018. That year, Isla explained that the group's premise was to operate with less inventory and, for this, the total integration between stores and the online channel was key.

When the pandemic broke out, the plan went from necessary to crucial. "SINT has played an incredible role. When the stores were closed, we were able to offer our customers online the product we had in the physical points", argued the manager. At the start of last year, the group had only 965 stores open of the 7,412 that it had at that time or, what is the same, only 13% of its commercial network was operational.

Meanwhile, the online channel has experienced a dizzying growth. If in 2017 Internet sales accounted for 10% of the group's net transactions-some 2,533 million euros- , the outbreak of the pandemic caused the group to pulverize all forecasts. The mission was that, in 2022, online sales represented 25% of turnover. Today, it contributes 32%: 6,612 million.

In the company's most challenging year, digital sales grew by 77%. In 2020, the integration of both technologies was extended to all formats. Thus, the group, which brings together 8 brands, sells in 202 markets through its online platform and the 6,758 stores that operated at 30 April 2021.

Sources close to the Galician company agree that the implementation of the system, carried out with technological partners but with a powerful role of internal departments, reached its final phase before the coronavirus invaded everything: "It has helped a lot to have those sales figures and stock reduction despite the storm of 2020".

It was the summer of 2014 when the group announced the implementation of Radio Frequency Identification Technology (RFID). It was a system that allowed the unique identification of each garment through radio frequency waves that were recorded on a chip inside the alarm. The goal was to instantly locate any product and streamline the logistics process to get it to any store in the world in a maximum of 48 hours.

Then, Pablo Isla said that the application represented "the most important change in the operations of the group's stores so far". He was not mistaken: Inditex's forecast was that the technology would be operational in all Zara stores in 2016. Only 4 years later, it was already implanted in the 8 ensigns of the group.

Sources close to Inditex highlight the key role of this system to channel all the online growth that would follow, while requiring that it was carried out by technology partners such as the global provider of security solutions Check Point.

The company's 2018 annual report pointed to this system as the architect of enriching customer-brand interaction, regardless of the channel the customer chooses. José Luis Pavia, former executive director of Lefties for 5 years and now director of Sociedad Textil Lonia, agrees: "The development of the online channel has brought with it an improvement and integration of stocks of physical and online channels. The implementation of RFID for instant stock management is the best proof of this."

Isla emphasized the" key role " that integrated inventory management had played in achieving the group's latest results. Its turnover between February and April beat all forecasts and rebounded by 50%. Even if the sale is considered between May and the first week of June, this was 5% higher than the same period of 2019, before the impact of the coronavirus.

The executive stressed that both technologies had a lot to do with the gross margin, which stood at 59.9%, compared to 58.4% a year earlier, reaching 2,962 million euros. Sources close to the core of the company, point out that the quality and speed of rollout development of the omnichannel model in countries and chains, which has been completed with the integration of online and offline stock, can be considered a success and a unique example in the sector.

José Luis Pavia, director of Sociedad Textil Lonia-which operates the brands CH / Carolina Herrera and Purificación García -, adds that Inditex has achieved a balance between merchandise costs and the origins and margins of response. That is: an improvement in the execution times of purchases.

"Bangladesh is an origin that offers better cost prices than Portugal, but requires longer delivery times than our neighboring country. This advance in the purchase decision implies a greater commercial risk. Buying in the Portuguese country has a higher cost but, being able to delay the purchase decision, it allows you to minimize this commercial risk and buy with more information," he explains.

"In the last 10 years, Inditex has professionalized all its commercial structures with more technical profiles oriented to information management for decision making. "It used to be more intuitive; now, using objective data, it's more predictive," Pavia concludes.

Sources close to the company predict that the SINT will evolve as a piece of the Inditex Open Platform (IOP): "That is the future".

What is the Inditex Open Platform? A group-controlled technology platform that supports all key company functions and aligns business and technology needs.

If at the start of 2020 the platform supported 60% of Inditex's digital activities, the latest quarterly results of the group revealed that the technology, which the company defines as "scalable, agile and enormously flexible", was already implemented at 90%.

A role that is reflected in the investment chapter of Inditex: the company will mobilize 900 million euros per year until 2022. It will allocate 1,000 million in 3 years to boost the digital area.