Seed17 December 2024

Loadar secures £3.1m seed funding led by Frontline Ventures to fuel US expansion

Frontline Ventures led the seed round with participation from Techstart Ventures to support team growth and American expansion.

£3.1MSeed

Loadar provides a digital automation platform for global shippers to procure and manage freight carriers. The company is based in Belfast.

Belfast-based freight procurement platform Loadar has secured a £3.1m seed investment. Frontline Ventures led the round, with additional backing from existing investor Techstart Ventures. The company intends to deploy the capital to expand its operations into the United States and grow its headcount over the coming year.

The logistics sector relies heavily on manual processes and third-party intermediaries, prompting the development of Loadar to serve super-large enterprises. Led by founder and CEO Ciaran Doherty, the platform provides automated workflows and real-time oversight to help reduce shipping expenses.

From the founder

"For the super-large enterprises moving product all over the globe, transport procurement and management is a major expense both financially and in terms of time. Teams are often individually managing hundreds of carrier relationships, it truly has become an impossible task to do well. Third-party logistic (3PL) companies are inefficient and fail at promoting crucial strategic partnerships between shippers and their carriers. It’s a challenge in need of a solution, and today’s funding announcement is the next major step for us to be able to provide that solution."

Ciaran Doherty

Founder and CEO at Loadar

Investor perspective

"Loadar is a wonderful example of innovation born out of Northern Ireland. Ciaran and his team have every necessary attribute to successfully scale what is a clearly needed solution to a problematic link in the supply chain."