Singapore-based Insignia Ventures Partners, founded by former Sequoia Capital venture partner Yinglan Tan, has invested USD600,000 in Vietnamese freight-with-trucker connecting platform LOGIVAN. 

Linh Pham, Founder of LOGIVAN, confirmed the investment to DEALSTREETASIA in an interaction. She told the portal that the newly-raised capital will enable it to expand to Ho Chi Minh City and other major economic hubs in Vietnam, serving companies that have high transportation needs.

After noticing that 70% trucks in Vietnam returned empty due to a fragmented logistics market, Pham founded LOGIVAN as a connecting platform for trucks, becoming the first company in Vietnam working to ‘Uberize’ the trucking industry with technology.

LOGIVAN offers a central platform that tracks the location of freight and truck. In doing so, it is able to optimize truck routes and reduce their empty load return rates.

In order to book a truck, clients access LOGIVAN’s marketplace on the web and indicate how many trucks they require and what kind of cargo they need to be delivered.

Pham, a former Goldman Sachs technology analyst and Cambridge University graduate, earlier founded Snappetite, a platform for deals before launching LOGIVAN. According to the World Bank’s ranking, Vietnam is 64th out of 160 countries in the world and 4th in ASEAN after Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand in logistics development.

Vietnam’s logistics costs remain high, equivalent to over 20% of GDP while these costs account for between 9% and 14% of GDP in developed countries, according to Vietnam Logistics Association.

Insignia Ventures Partners is a venture capital firm specializing in startup investments. In February, it closed its maiden fund at USD120 million. The milestone came less than a year after Tan left Sequoia’s office in Singapore, and also marks the largest ever maiden vehicle by a venture capital firm in this region.

Source: https://www.dealstreetasia.com