BERLIN, June 9 (Reuters) – German freight technology firm Sennder said on Tuesday it was merging with French peer Everoad in a deal that keeps it on track for its target of 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion) in revenue by 2024.
Sennder, founded in 2015, is merging with the smaller Everoad in a stock-based deal after receiving fresh financial backing from their existing venture investors, CEO and co-founder David Nothacker told Reuters.
The capital injection, running into the tens of millions of dollars, will carry Sennder through to an external funding round pencilled in for September 2021.
“France is an important but difficult market that we have been handling from Germany. We realised we needed to do something there if we want to achieve our turnover goal,” Nothacker said in an interview.
Berlin-based Sennder, a freight forwarder which runs a technology platform that matches cargoes with trucks, said the merger would create a business that handles 35,000 loads per month and serves 10,000 trucking firms and enterprise partners.
It is still on the lookout for deals to expand into the Benelux countries, Scandinavia and Eastern Europe, Nothacker said, as the market recovers from national lockdowns that reduced kilometres travelled by up to 35%.
Sennder competes with Kuehne und Nagel and Uber Freight in the market for full-truck consignments that makes up more than a third of Europe’s 400 billion euros in annual freight volumes.
It raised $100 million last year from investors led by Lakestar, valuing the business at $300 million.
Everoad, whose senior management will stay on, previously raised 17.5 million euros from investors including Germany’s Earlybird, which joined the latest internal funding round.
Earlybird partner Fabian Heilemann said the merger created a company with the potential to become Europe’s first $1 billion logistics tech firm, and backed further acquisitions.
$1 = 0.8869 euros
Editing by Mark Potter