As Porter builds truck driver network across India, it bags funding from Sequoia Capital

India’s Porter, an online logistics marketplace, has bagged US$5.5 million in series A funding from Sequoia Capital, existing investor Kae Capital, and other angel investors. The development just comes three months after receiving US$500,000.

Just like UberCARGO, the startup has built a network of drivers to transport heavy goods within the city. “Through the use of mobile technology for demand and supply aggregation, Porter is able to build a transparent marketplace, thus increasing vehicle utilization while providing a standardized service. Business transportation will be transformed by smartphones, just as consumer transportation has been,” says Gautam Mago, managing director of Sequoia Capital, which also backed Ola, a popular taxi app in India.

“We chose to raise funding from Sequoia because we found that there is some synergy and analogy between passenger and goods transport,” Porter co-founder Pranav Goel tells Tech in Asia. Goel is an Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) graduate who started the company about a year ago with other IIT-ians Uttam Digga and Vikas Choudhary.

It is important to note that Ola has also entered the business transportation space with food delivery and is reportedly planning to start delivering groceries as well. Since both count Sequoia as a common investor, it could be a potential acquisition target.

Solving logistics woes

The Porter team

Porter will use much of its funding to open up APIs to enable ecommerce startups to provide logistics support. Goel said that the profits in servicing businesses is much higher than that of individual people. Another complex problem to solve would be helping consumers load and unload their items when moving house.

The startup is focused on servicing furniture and electronics stores, fast-moving consumer goods companies, grocery stores, and ecommerce players through clients like Godrej, Reliance, ITC, Urban Ladder, Delhivery, and Aramex.

The 10-month-old startup claims to have 300 vehicles handling 10,000 transactions every month in Mumbai and Delhi. It plans to launch operations in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, and Ahmedabad.

It also provides reporting and intelligence tools that allow businesses real-time monitoring of the vehicles they use.

Logistics is highly fragmented in India with no large players dominating the market. However, over a dozen startups have mushroomed all over the country in the past year.

Some of the other funded startups in the space include Unitus Seed Fund-backed Blowhorn, Sol Primero and Outbox Ventures-funded TheKarrier, Cricket icon Yuvraj Singh supported Moovo, and i2india Venture Factory seeded Shippr.