Tiger Global, Falcon Edge lead Series B round in logistics technology startup Locus

Mara Labs Inc., a Delaware and Bengaluru-based startup that provides logistics management solutions under the brand Locus, has raised nearly $26 million (Rs 183 crore at current foreign exchange rates) in a fresh round of funding from a clutch of investors.

According to the company’s filing with the US-based SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission), the company has raised $25.78 million (Rs 181.86 round) from around 17 investors. The round was closed last month.

In a statement, the company confirmed that it had raised $22 million as part of its Series-B round, led by Tiger and Falcon Edge along with participation from existing backers Exfinity Venture Partners and Blume Ventures.

A spokesperson for Locus said that the $4 million difference between the filing and the announcement was attributed to a preferential to equity share conversion from a previous funding round.

In June last year, the company had raised $4 million (Rs 26.8 crore then) in a pre-Series B round of funding from new investors that included Rocketship.vc, Recruit Strategic Partners, pi Ventures and Hemendra Kothari of DSP Group. Existing investors Blume Ventures, Exfinity Venture Partners, BeeNext and growX Ventures had also participated in the round.

The funds will be utilised to penetrate deeper into its new markets, North America and Southeast Asia, which it entered last year.  Besides, it will also be used for enhancing its geography-based product & solutions besides expanding the local teams.

Locus

The venture was founded in March 2015 by Rastogi, a BITS Pilani alumnus, and Geet Garg, an IIT Kharagpur alumnus. Both had earlier worked together at Amazon. The company provides its flagship product from its Bengaluru-based Indian subsidiary.

Locus helps tech-based enterprises to manage their deliveries. It offers features like automated smart dispatches, tracking, fleet visualisation, proprietary geocoder and proprietary route deviation engine. The company offers the entire logistics technology stack in the form of a platform-as-a-service.

“Locus provides autonomous supply chain optimization thus minimizing the dependency on human intelligence…. Product applications include clubbing of forward and reverse logistics in a single route plan, schedule & on-demand dispatch planning, and automatic escalation management. Locus is on a ….path to automate every possible decision in the supply chain.,” Rastogi stated.

According to information available on the company’s website, its logistic-tech solutions can be used in inter-city long haul, hyperlocal deliveries, 3PL (third party logistics), first and last mile deliveries for e-commerce companies, reverse logistics and ridesharing. The broad swathe of the company’s clientele includes e-commerce, logistics and FMCG companies.

Recent deals in the logistics sector

•  May 2019: Zinka Logistics Solutions Pvt. Ltd, which owns business-to-business (B2B) technology-enabled logistics startup BlackBuck, closed a $150-million (Rs 1,050 crore at current exchange rate) Series D round.
•  March 2019: Gurugram-based logistics company Delhivery Pvt. Ltd raised $413 million(Rs 2,890 crore) in a funding round led by SoftBank Vision Fund, becoming the country’s first logistics-tech unicorn.
• February 2019: Xpressbees, an Alibaba Group-backed e-commerce logistics company, raised Rs 35 crore ($5 million then) in venture debt from InnoVen Capital.
• February 2019: Logistics-technology firm Rivigo raised $35.6 million in a fresh round of funding from previous investors Warburg Pincus and SAIF Partners, inching closer towards unicorn status.