Homegrown startup Haulio announced yesterday (January 17) that it has raised US$7 million in a Series A funding round.
According to the company, the fresh injection of funds will be used to drive stronger haulage capabilities, enhance service quality, elevate product engineering and development, reinforce talent acquisition, and further scale its regional growth.
The funding round was led by Temasek unit Heliconia Capital, with participation from new and existing investors across the globe.
Among the new investors were Ondine Capital (China), Cornerstone Ventures (Taiwan), FuturePlay (South Korea), Newtown Partners via the Imperial Venture Fund (South Africa), and corporate executives from XA Network.
Existing investors including B7 Capital, ComfortDelGro, iSeed SEA, Iterative (United States) and PSA unboXed, also participated.
“Haulio has created a powerful digital platform that bridges the traditional haulage business offline-online thereby transforming the first-mile logistics operations,” said Derek Lau, Heliconia Capital.
“The founders’ deep understanding of this business should continue to help accelerate growth domestically and overseas. We look forward to working closely with the team and supporting them.”
Expects to triple revenue by end-2022
Founded in 2017, Haulio aims to evolve the logistics and supply chain industry by providing on-demand haulage services while optimising resources, ensuring both cost and time savings.
In April 2021, Haulio officially opened its first regional office in Bangkok, Thailand. In under nine months, its Thailand office has transacted over 500,000 containers and crossed seven figures in revenue.
Last June, Haulio also partnered with shipping and logistics global leader CMA CGM to move its containers on the major inland corridor of Laem Chabang and Lat Krabang, thus significantly increasing Haulio’s presence in the country.
Haulio is primed for further regional expansion to continue its digital aggregation of haulier network across Southeast Asia. To support its growth plans into markets such as Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, and Vietnam, Haulio said it is actively hiring top talent in strategic business functions.
“We started Haulio with a bold mission to empower the lives of millions of haulier drivers in Southeast Asia and become the key platform of growth for them through our technology and network effect,” said Alvia Ea, co-founder and CEO of Haulio.
“The complex and fragmented nature of our business continues to be a challenge especially when container haulage has been a vertical that often gets left behind. This investment will accelerate our regional growth and the transition of haulage standards from offline to online, as we remain steadfast in our vision to haul all containers in and out of Southeast Asia through our platform.”
Haulio has also expanded its offerings to include embedded financing and leasing solutions as it strives to be a key technology partner for the traditional haulier market segment.
In 2021, Haulio partnered with fintech players such as Funding Societies and Aspire to offer faster pay-out and supply chain financing, as well as with ComfortDelGro and Goldbell to offer leasing of prime mover trucks.
To date, it has transacted more than two million containers, with over half of the transactions completed in 2021 alone. Haulio expects to triple their revenue numbers by the end of the year as the global supply chain recovers.
Featured Image Credit: Haulio