Trukkin raises $7 million Series A to grow its trucking platform in Middle East & Pakistan

Dubai-headquartered trucking platform Trukkin has raised $7 million in a Series A round led by Saudi-based Emkan Capital, it announced in a statement today. Impact 46, Taya Group, and other ‘strategic investors’ also joined the round. The startup had previously raised $3.5 million in May 2019.

Founded in 2017 by Janardan Dalmia, Trukkin connects shippers with truckers (individuals and companies) in 12 countries across the region, with offices in United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan. According to its website, the startup has over 2,000 transporters and 10,000 drivers in its network – who have moved 50,000+ shipments, to date. It claims to have grown 3x since the start of the pandemic.

The company that started with the United Arab Emirates and Saudi expanded to Pakistan in August 2020 becoming the first regional trucking marketplace to have launched here. Since then, Egypt’s Trella has also expanded to Pakistan – with at least half a dozen local players also launching similar marketplaces.

Trukkin said that it is also building fintech solutions for payments, insurance, and financial services to serve the transporters and drivers who work with them. Janardan Dalmia, the founder and CEO of Trukkin sharing more details about this told MENAbytes that they’re working on digitizing the payments for truck drivers so they can receive instant payments faster and use them easily, without having to deal with cash.

Commenting on the investment, in a statement, he said, “I’m very proud of the team and the growth we’ve achieved over the course of the last year as we expanded into Pakistan and grew revenues despite the difficult environment presented by Covid. We are excited to close the round with strategic investors like Emkan Capital and Impact46, it confirms our vision of creating a world-class regional aggregation platform to enable logistics for the shippers and transporters.”

“We see enormous growth potential in the logistics industry in the MENAP region, the size of the market is considerable at over $50 billion. Currently, local fragmented players dominate the market in the region, and we are working to be an enabler that brings this fragmented market together on an integrated, world-class platform to showcase collective growth,” added Janardan.

Ghassan Aloshban, General Partner at Emkan Capital, said, “Trukkin has exhibited incredibly efficient use of capital and we’re very impressed with what they’ve been able to achieve in such a short time frame. Its core team with over 200+ years of combined industry experience have showcased their expertise in not only navigating but driving growth during the pandemic. We look forward to supporting Trukkin, in serving hundreds of corporate clients and individual shippers as they aggressively look for expansion and growth in reach, capability and business volume.”

Abdulrahman Al-Modaimeegh, the Managing Partner at Impact46, said, “Looking into Saudia Arabia’s geographic location, it demonstrates a large local and regional traffic of logistics movement reflecting the fragmented sector that still operates in a traditional way and lacking the innovative/ digital solution. Trukkin platform is in the right position to regulate the industry and simplify the supply chain with its digital services. Trukkin plays a vital role in enabling a group of independent truck drivers to increase their efficiency at a lower cost to clients.”