It was by accident that we entered the logistics space, after I returned from the US, had an opportunity to build IT for an upcoming Logistics company. As days progressed, I couldn't help but dive deep into the day-to-day issues and try to solve them with learnings and knowledge from my experiences. 

Together with Venu, I delved & we realised the fragmentation of the ecosystem and its inefficiencies and soon found ourselves brainstorming on what it would take to help all transporters and truckers reap the benefits of technology.

This was the beginning of LOBB.

There were a lot of issues to solve. Initially we picked few issues and focused on them. One key issue was “Truck utilization was only 13-15 days per month, while optimally it could run at least 25 days”, due to sub-optimal utilization of assets, truckers were losing revenue.

Transportation demand is driven by local and regional transporters who reach out to brokers who are micro-market focussed, micro-entrepreneurs, who operate using pen and paper.

Through conventional brokers the reach of supply for demand and vice versa was limited & not always optimal. This information asymmetry, presented an opportunity for us in a $100 Bn Long Haul trucking business.

We understood there was need for a curated marketplace, we set about with a few key customers to provide more miles per month for truck owners.

We started to gain traction in Bangalore, Chennai and Mumbai. With consistent repeat business we started growing.

With a strong belief in creating long term sustainable business, we focussed on being Unit Economic Positive from Day 1 by building products that are value driven and highly customer centric.

A novel approach of Realtime Payments & Track and Trace without GPS device, our repeat business contributed to over 80% of our transactions. Truckers on our platform started earning 20% more than their peers.

The idle halting period is one of the biggest challenges that truckers are facing. If the truck is halted one day it costs them a significant amount of money for food, lodging and parking charges, resulting in losses and less asset utilization. LOBB’s biggest USP is our network that provides the trucker with the next load right after unloading and thereby reducing idle halting periods.

Another thing that worked well for us was our focus on the Mid and Small transporter segment, which helped us to deploy and allocate capital more efficiently. Our deep domain knowledge and data insights helped us in solving critical issues plaguing the industry. 

Mr. Mohandas Pai backed 3one4 Capital invested in a seed round and actively advised us. We thank Team 3one4 for their solid support at every stage of our growth and journey. We overcame a lot of challenges during the last two years owing to lockdowns and Covid19. During covid19 our customers could realise the significance of our platform and we started growing exponentially. 

With growing demands from customers we have grown from 3 cities to 17 cities in the last 15 months. Most of our new cities attracted business from Day 1 and all locations have hit break-even within 60days. 

With the grind in the initial 3 cities we learned to walk, now it’s time to run. 

We are glad to announce that we have raised $1.1Mn Pre Series A. With lead investor, Byju Pillai, group managing director, Inflow Technologies and angel investor Gopal Kaul. The round also saw participation from 3one4 Capital and other investors including, Srinath Ramakkrushnan (Zetwerk & Ofbusiness), Mohit Mittal (Southern Cargo Carriers), M D Ramaswami (former MD, Dell India) and Vishad Gupta (Fidelity Information Services, India).

What next?

We are happy to say that LOBB is India’s largest digital freight brokerage platform today. We are making significant investments in our ML and Fin-tech products. Our data currently points to 30 new cities with high density and high volumes, we plan to expand. 

Thanks to each and every employee for your active role in building LOBB and thanks to our advisors and well-wishers for being part of the journey.

To strengthen our network, we are hiring at all levels including Technology, Business Development and Operations across India 🇮🇳.

If you are looking for an early-stage startup with exponential growth, Join us @Lobb (send us your resume at jobs@lobb.in)