10+ Opportunities Emerged After Shutting Down Shipitwise

The game is not over until it is over.

Two weeks ago, we announced that we are halting Shipitwise operations. Hoping that someone with a plan would appear. Not that we ran out of ideas. Instead, we understood that we had taken too big a shot to finish it alone.

Luckily, we now have a queue of possible cavalry at the door.

Aleksander first proposed the idea of building Shipitwise to Olari after experiencing the hassle of shipping stuff internationally, again.

For 10+ years, Aleksander had built various old-school businesses where items had to be moved internationally — with the process always being a pain.

Meanwhile, both Olari and Aleksander had travelled the world, occasionally looking to buy big artefacts but never being able to do that as there is no international shipping available for individuals in a foreign country.

In short, they figured other people might have experienced similar situations and wanted to change it for all

Not that they wanted to start a startup (both had 2 other profitable businesses). But only because no one else seemed to try transforming the industry.

Shipitwise landing pages over the years have changed drastically.

After burning €1'000'000, we have an algorithm that could assemble the most efficient transportation routes in seconds.

Through the four years of building Shipitwise, we raised €550'000 and made another €450'000 in turnover. This helped us build the product that was used to ship 5000 items across the world — bikes, skies, furniture, mini submarines, alcohol samples, animal blood and much more.

When we started, our focus was on directly helping travellers ship anything. Then started to deliver timely stuff for various SMBs. Finally opting to give the platform to airlines and fleet owners to digitise their business, one by one.

All this testing enabled us to learn the ins-and-outs of this outdated industry. And the more we experienced, the better we knew that something so complex cannot be changed by a handful of Estonians with peanuts in our pockets.

Thus, we decided to halt the operations and explore our options.

The game is not over until it is over.

After publishing the news, we were approached by people all over the world. Until now, we have had discussions with entrepreneurs from Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Germany, India, Lithuania, Singapore and the US.

Some approached us to learn more about our experience, as they have had an idea to build something similar in the logistics space. Two of them wanted to check our platform from the inside to see whether it would make sense for them to repackage our platform for their clients.

But then there are a few others that actually think they could integrate our solution into their offering:

1. An enterprise marketplace for the airline industry that connects aircraft parts buyers and sellers through seamless transactions.
2. A software company that has built a tool to sell custom-built and modular homes online.
3. An outsourced logistics company that digitises supply chains via real-time data flow management and related services.
4. A company with an Uber clone for trucking application that enables their customers to find drivers in an instant.
5. A company with a full-service delivery for online retailers in the US.
6. Another transportation management system company with a system to optimize workflow between shippers and carriers.
7. A startup building a logistics API which is marketed as the last logistics API you want. Ever.

+ A few starting companies that have invited us to join as co-founders or who might want to lease our algorithm to speed up their go-to-market.

Shipitwise platform could be used in all those cases!

And many others.

For some, they could use it to calculate the shipping cost of their products as their customers add them to the cart. Enabling them to optimise their offerings based on the final price and delivery time.

For others, they could use it to further automate their offerings — e.g. build more efficient supply chains, offer dynamic pricing or provide tracking.

So where are we now?

After having initial calls and meetings with everyone, we are now getting ready for follow-up meetings.

In fact, one of those companies called us less than 24 hours after our chat and announced that they want to move further, now. So tomorrow we will have our first 4-hour due diligence meeting with them.

Still, we understand that this might not be a quick process!

And we promise to keep you informed on how the things will be evolving.

All in all, we see that there is enough interest in what we have built. Meanwhile, we had a chat among the team and we are willing to go into a deal with someone for certain.

At the same time, we only have one comment: Next time, please come to us (or any other company) earlier.

That said, we still want to hear from you if you are an investor, incumbent or a startup in the transportation space or if you are interested in the IP that we have created — feel free to reach out to us aleksander@shipitwise.com.