Last-Mile Delivery Firm Onfleet Raises $23M in Series B Round

Last-mile delivery management software platform Onfleet has raised $23 million in a Series B fundraising round that it will use to accelerate its technological growth and expand its product and engineering capabilities, according to a company press release Tuesday (June 7).

Businesses call on Onfleet to help them launch, optimize and scale their delivery operations, the press release said. Kayne Partners, the dedicated growth equity group of Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors, led the company’s Series B funding round, with participation from existing investor Savant Growth. The latest round brings the company’s total capital raised to more than $40 million.

Kayne Partners’ Robert Shilton will join Onfleet’s board of directors as part of the company’s investment, according to the press release.

“This new round will help Onfleet accelerate innovation in several key areas and broaden our product offering so we can help existing customers scale their operations while expanding in new markets,” said Khaled Naim, Onfleet’s CEO and co-founder.

“The funding will enable us to accelerate the growth of our team and invest even more in our machine learning, route optimization and workforce management features,” he said. “We’re ready for our next chapter and look forward to continuing to service our customers with industry-leading last mile solutions.”

Onfleet’s route optimization cuts the number of drivers needed and miles driven, improving profit margins and reducing carbon emissions, the company press release said. Onfleet’s platform also provided retailers and consumers with real-time driver tracking and automated communication. Kroger, Total Wine & More, EQ3, Zumiez, and United Supermarkets are customers.

Related: Last Mile Delivery Providers Employ Technology to Manage Fuel Costs

Andrew Travis, chief operating officer at Onfleet, told PYMNTS that last-mile delivery is complicated and expensive, especially when it involves direct-to-consumer deliveries. The recent surge in the price of gas has added to these challenges. Historically, gas accounts for 10% to 15% of the cost of last mile delivery, and that’s been inching higher.

The rising price of gas affects different sorts of delivery providers in different ways. For companies that crowdsource the labor, it magnifies the difficulty of keeping drivers because it’s the drivers who buy the fuel. For companies that own and operate their own fleet, the price of gas impacts the margin per delivery and overall operating costs.