India’s Rivigo raises $65M to expand its freight and logistics platform

Rivigo, a tech startup in India that wants to build a more reliable and safer logistics network, has raised $65 million as major investors continue to place big bets on opportunities in overhauling the trucking system in the country.

The Series E round (which has not closed) for the five-year-old startup was led by existing investors Warburg Pincus and SAIF Partners. The startup, which has raised more than $280 million to date, said it aims to be profitable by March next year.

Rivigo operates a tech platform that tracks and manages shipments and ensures that drivers are available at all times and trucks are as fully loaded as possible. The platform also automatically rotates drivers so that they can get enough rest and see their family while the trucks keep moving. Drivers use an app to navigate maps and accept assignments.

“Relay trucking is now very well established where relay truck pilots lead better life and customers gets exceptional service. With technology and freight marketplace, we now want to bring relay to every truck in the country,” Deepak Garg, founder and CEO of Rivigo, said in a statement.

Rivigo, which competes with heavily backed startups such as BlackBuck, owns its own fleet of trucks while also operating a freight marketplace. This separates it from competitors that serve purely as an aggregator — or Uber for trucks, if you will.

The startup, which claims to have the largest reach in India, said it would use the fresh capital to further expand its network and tech infrastructure in the country. Financially, too, Rivigo has driven past many of its competitors. In the financial year that ended in March this year, Rivigo’s revenue jumped to $105 million at a 77% year-over-year growth rate. Its losses also widened to $35 million, according to disclosures it made to the local regulator.

“From building algorithmically complex models to accurately predicting the life journey of a consignment to creating a dynamic pricing engine for the freight marketplace, the company is working on hundreds of unique problems at scale,” said Garg.

India’s logistics market, despite being valued at $160 billion, remains one of the most inefficient sectors that continues to drag the economy.

Last month, Rivigo launched National Freight Index that shows live tariff rates for different lanes and vehicles in the country in a bid to bring more transparency to the ecosystem.