2017 Under the Radar: TradeLanes eyes Midwestern Ag as future clients
August 29, 2017 | Meghan LeVota
Editor’s note: Startland News picked 10 early-stage firms to spotlight for its annual Under the Radar startups list. The following is one of 2017’s companies. To view the full list, click here.
A recent graduate of the 2017 Sprint Accelerator program, TradeLanes is a newbie in Kansas City and showing significant movement.
The TradeLanes platform automates global trade focused on agriculture firms, lowering costs and removing days from the supply chain. To date, more than 90,000 cargo units have been shipped using the platform, said co-founder Vijay Harrell.
Digitizing documents, tracking shipments, notifying shippers of supply status, online bookings and detailed reports, the TradeLanes platform aims to make trade more efficient, Harrell said.
Thanks to its participation in the Sprint Accelerator, Trade Lanes (formerly of Miami, Florida) developed a beneficial working relationship with Kansas City-based Dairy Farmers of America. Harrell said the firm hopes to continue a partnership with the Ag giant, as well as other Kansas City area corporations.
The Sprint Accelerator is the third accelerator program for TradeLanes, since the firm launched in 2015. It also participated in the FedEx Logistics Accelerator and Venture Hive Miami.
Following the Sprint Accelerator program, Harrell has made a Kansas City hire and plans to open an office in the Crossroads this fall. Harrell believes that Kansas City is the best place for the firm to do business thanks to its central location and abundance of potential corporate partners
TradeLanes is in the middle of raising a seed round, which has yet to be announced publicly. Harrell is excited to focus on snagging as many Kansas City-area customers as possible, he said.
Featured Business
2017 Startups to Watch
stats here
Related Posts on Startland News
Why this KC social entrepreneur pivoted from drilling wells with Matt Damon to tapping micro-loans for water projects
Identifying unmet needs is just as critical for social entrepreneurs as their counterparts at more traditional for-profit ventures, said Gary White, explaining how Water.org needed to find its missing piece to truly tap the non-profit’s potential. “Go after those unique insights at the intersection of a great social gain and a market,” said White, offering…
Newly relaunched PR platform connects small brands to freelance journalists eager to tell their stories
Blish Mize Connor and Allison Hogan are working to change the landscape of the public relations game, they shared, starting with firing themselves. The PR veterans — with a combined 35 years of experience — have launched DeskSides, a dual-sided digital hub to connect brands with journalists/freelancers. “We were tired of traveling and schlepping goods…
US company lands on the moon: Here’s how a KC firm helped boost its flames of innovation
For the first time ever, a commercial spacecraft has touched down on the moon and Kansas City-based Burns & McDonnell provided innovation that helped to make it possible for Intuitive Machines and its Odysseus IM-1 lander, shared Brittney Swartz. The local engineering, construction and architecture firm served as the designer and builder of Intuitive Machines’…
Why developers say folding Plexpod Westport site into Park 39 unifies $230M project
A move this week to transition management of the Plexpod Westport space to the developers behind a massive project along 39th Street will mean reuniting elements within the broader Park 39 campus, said Andrew Brain. “By unifying our actions on both sides of the street, we’re able to act as a whole instead of as…