True has invested in fulfilment startup, Huboo, as an extension to its seed investment round. True is teaming up with Ada Ventures, Maersk Growth and Episode 1, who is a co-investor in two of True’s existing seed portfolio companies, Klydo and ThirdEye.
Huboo is an end-to-end fulfilment platform, managing storage, picking, packing and delivery for its clients. At the heart of the business is a multi-faceted software platform which optimises all stages of the fulfilment process. The company primarily serves micro, small and mid-sized e-commerce businesses, a massively underserved market in the UK and abroad.
There are roughly 550,000 retail and consumer SMEs in the UK, 25% to 40% of which sell online. The products sold by many of these businesses tie into consumer trends around quality, proximity and provenance. Front-end platforms, such as Shopify and Amazon, service these businesses well , however, there are limited back end providers offering the services required. Huboo’s software-enabled operating model profitably serves these small to medium retail and consumer businesses, where many of their competitors cannot.
True will be supporting Huboo’s rapid commercial growth by plugging the startup into relevant companies and stakeholders in True’s Live Network.
Martin Bysh, CEO and Founder of Huboo, says: “Huboo is servicing a market which is commonly overlooked by fulfilment industry incumbents. Not only do we offer an end-to-end service to this market, but we do it at a price, and with a consistency, that other players can’t, due to our proprietary software platform.”
Paul Cocker, True’s Co-founder, comments: “True’s seed fund looks to invest in future-fit enterprise solutions, technologies and products for the retail and consumer space. Huboo’s business model is the perfect fit, especially for small online businesses currently facing a spike in demand due to many of their customers being housebound. We believe that True’s Live Network can accelerate the growth of Huboo and are looking forward to working with two talented and experienced founders in Martin Bysh and Paul Dodd.”