SMBs

Former Flexport associate raises $6.5M for SMB freight management platform

Freight management platform Portex announced Thursday it has raised $6.25 million in seed funding to further develop its technology for small and midsize shippers. The funding round was led by Footwork VC, with participation from Cowboy Ventures and previous investors, Susa Ventures and Base10.

Founded in 2022 by Brittany Ennix, Portex was inspired by Ennix’s family background in manufacturing and her experience at Uber and Flexport, where she worked with midmarket clients.

In an interview with...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/former-flexport-associate-raises-6-5m-for-smb-freight-management-platform

How SMBs can win (and have won) during the pandemic

How SMBs can win during a global crisis

Chuck Kuhn has been president and CEO of JK Moving Services for almost 40 years, but he’s never faced a test quite like this. Kuhn’s company, a medium-size independent moving service headquartered in Virginia, is inherently reliant on drivers to make the business run, but when COVID-19 hit, finding them became near-impossible.

“Prior to the pandemic, by no means was it easy to recruit and retain quality drivers,” Kuhn told Modern Shipper, “but it was nowhere near as difficult as it is today.”

Call...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/how-smbs-can-win-and-have-won-during-the-pandemic

Sendle cuts shipping rates for small businesses with Sendle Swift program

The upstart last-mile logistics firm Sendle, which is already trying to muscle into the U.S. parcel delivery market with its flat-rate shipping and no surcharge promises, is upping its game again with Sendle Swift, a two-day courier service designed for small and midsize sellers in nine U.S. states.

Sendle Swift slashes the prices on two-day shipping in Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah and Washington to as low as $2.60 per package. The company said it plans...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/sendle-cuts-shipping-rates-for-small-businesses-with-sendle-swift-program

OceanWaves: Are SMBs being left out in the cold?

This fireside chat recap is from FreightWaves’ OceanWaves Summit on Wednesday.

TOPIC: Are SMBs being left out in the cold?

DETAILS: The founder and CEO of Global Gateway Logistics discusses trends she has seen within her business and how the current market differentiates between SMEs and large, enterprise global shippers. The global transportation veteran also diagnoses issues with current industry technology and operational areas that are being overlooked.

SPEAKER: Caitlin Murphy is the founder...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/oceanwaves-are-smbs-being-left-out-in-the-cold

Alibaba unit rolls out shipping tools for US small businesses

Alibaba.com, the business-to-business platform of the Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding (NASDAQ:BABA), said Thursday it has added dropshipping and other transport and logistics services for its U.S.-based small to midsize customers that increasingly rely on digital tools to grow their global sales.

Under the dropshipping concept, an online merchant holds no inventory and usually depends on suppliers or third-parties to ship products directly to the end user. The shipping component...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/alibaba-unit-rolls-out-shipping-tools-for-us-small-businesses

LTL platform MyCarrier raises $8M Series A

Carrier-distributed platform analyzes SMB shipper behavior

MyCarrier, a software company with a less-than-truckload transportation management system for small and midsize shippers, announced Tuesday morning that it had raised an $8 million Series A venture capital round led by Greycroft and Lerer Hippeau.

MyCarrier was founded in 2017 by Michael Bookout and Chris Scheid, both transportation industry veterans who worked together at GlobalTranz. The company launched its minimum viable product in...

https://s29755.pcdn.co/news/ltl-platform-mycarrier-raises-8-million-series-a

UPS Capital offering shipment-based insurance through AscendTMS

AscendTMS and UPS Capital offer freight insurance product

Customers of AscendTMS and UPS Capital can now easily acquire shipment-specific insurance through the transportation management system (TMS) with just a few keystrokes.

UPS Capital, a subsidiary of UPS (NYSE: UPS), is now offering the option for AscendTMS users to help them fill gaps in coverage.

“We are offering a better option — a true insurance solution to cover the full value of goods,” Mark Robinson, president of UPS Capital, said in a statement. “Our goal in working with AscendTMS is to...

https://www.freightwaves.com/news/ups-capital-offering-shipment-based-insurance-through-ascendtms