Sep 28, 2020

Logistics: Winterthur-based Startup Luckabox closed seven-figure pre-series A round September 28, 2020   Luckabox, the Winterthur based VentureKick and KickStart alum was proud to be among Top 100 Swiss Startups announced on September 9th landing in 30th place. This announcement comes off a recent seven-figure pre-series A round which will serve to reshape Luckabox’s product aimed at managing the end-to-end last mile logistics process for retailers. The latest round has existing investors Alpana Ventures, SICTIC and DAA Capital rejoin while adding new investors that include Bettina Hein, a serial technology entrepreneur and ‘lioness’ on TV24’s hit show “Höhle der Löwen Schweiz”. “I invested in Luckabox because of the extremely strong female founder team,” says Hein. “The pandemic has amplified the need for Luckabox’s solution and I’m excited about the company’s explosive growth.”   The coronavirus pandemic has accelerated the company’s growth by 600% as retailers rushed to fulfill orders. “Ecommerce’s boom has shown companies how critical it is to streamline their delivery processes and that need is only going to go up,” says Aike Festini who co-founded Luckabox with a fellow female and currently acts as the company’s CEO. Retailers that want to optimise last mile delivery to get the best price and quality typically have to work with multiple courier companies. That interaction between retailer and courier is done via a series of emails, calls, spreadsheets and documents resulting in wasted time and energy. In addition, retailers have to deal with their end customer’s ever changing delivery demands such as new time windows, lost packages and little tracking visibility only to coordinate those issues to the courier company. Luckabox’s offering takes the load off of retailers and manages the last mile for them. “Imagine a process where a customer places an order with a retailer and that order gets delivered without the retailer having to lift a finger. That’s what we do, we manage last mile delivery for the retailer, so the retailer’s responsibility ends post transaction,” says Luckabox Co-founder and COO Maite Mihm. But do customers trust Luckabox enough to be completely “hands off”? “It’s all about transparency,” says Mihm. Their latest fundraise will help fuel a next gen product that provides retailers an overview of their deliveries through Luckabox intuitive dashboard allowing them to track the most minute details of the last mile delivery process. Mihm reassures retailers that they will always have the option to step in at any time to tweak a delivery or change the carrier Luckabox’ algorithm has chosen. But overtime, the hope is that retailers will be “hands off” and trust that their orders are being delivered seamlessly by Luckabox giving retailers more time to sell more products. That “hands off” value prop is backed by retailer confidence made possible by Luckabox’s vast carrier network and services; one of which is its contribution to sustainability which helped secure a 70K CHF grant from Klimafonds Stadtwerk Winterthur’s allotted to innovative CO2 reduction initiatives in the region. “We are immensely grateful for the Klimafonds’ recognition of our sustainability practices as markets begin to demand ‘greener’ delivery services more and more” said Mihm. When asked about competitors, “there are solutions out there which provide a dashboard for retailers to manage last mile themselves but we’re the only ones that manage it on behalf of the retailer,” affirms Festini. Those solutions described by Festini require the retailer to add their own carrier contracts and still manage the carrier relationship, something that Luckabox has offered to do for the retailer. Luckabox currently boasts an impressive network of 50+ professional carriers ranging from local bike couriers to mid and larger-sized express operators and taxi providers with coverage throughout all of Switzerland. Their delivery services include same day, next day and scheduled deliveries as far out as a month. With a range of services and nationwide coverage, retailers can now sit back, relax and watch their goods be delivered without a hitch. LuckaBox is a cloud-based multi-carrier last mile forwarder for retailers. Developed to optimize last mile delivery, their technology offers a wide range of integration options. LuckaBox allows retailers to import shipments from the most popular sales channels easily and automatically and to execute them through the optimal logistics service provider. Further Information: https://www.luckabox.com Logo (c) LuckaBox