Sydney company Freight Exchange has capped a watershed year with exceptional growth and is now looking to take its online freight capacity marketplace overseas with support from the NSW Government.
Deputy Premier and Minister for Regional NSW, Small Business and Skills, John Barilaro, said the company, which received a $98,000 Building Partnerships (BP) Grant from private-sector led, NSW government backed Jobs for NSW, had grown 587% in 2015/16 with revenue of more than $1 million and over 800 carriers and 1700 shippers on its books.
“Freight Exchange is a great example of a clever company developing technology to make NSW more efficient while creating jobs and growing the economy,” Mr Barilaro said
Former management consultant and Freight Exchange founder and CEO Cate Hull saw the massive amount of underutilised capacity of trucks on Australian roads and she knew she was on to something.
This smart online platform that uses GPS tracking to take advantage of unused capacity on long haul freight by connecting shippers with carriers and allowing them to instantly book their freight, get a price and get it moving.
How is Freight exchange doing so far?
The company, which now has 12 staff and focuses on long-haul trucking, has developed apps which allow companies big and small to plug directly into the system to match unused capacity with freight orders instantly.
“After building the company from scratch Cate is now hoping to take the company global, with a pilot set for New Zealand this month and plans to expand to Shenzhen, Singapore and Hong Kong,” Mr Barilaro said.
Cate Hull said the Jobs for NSW Building Partnerships grant had been a huge help in growing the business.
“To big businesses it might sound like a small amount but to us it was significant,” she said.
“We used the Jobs for NSW grant to build the product, but also to deal with the growing pains of a small company – the team has close to doubled in the past year.
“The more we can drive efficiency the better it is for NSW. The dream is to create a platform that in future orchestrates self-driving trucks and automates the buying of selling and freight capacity internationally – a global platform,” Cate said.
