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
‘This one felt pretty epic’: PorchFestKC saturates neighbors with six hours of music, 135 artists
Returning to the steps for PorchFestKC four years later — albeit on a different porch and in a new neighborhood — Erica McKenzie was wowed by the walk-up audience’s reaction to her performance Saturday at the resurrected Midtown music festival. “I’ve always had a lovely turnout the past few years but this one felt pretty epic,”…
Supporters-turned critics: Sales tax for east side projects ‘went off the rails’; KCMO mayor defends effort’s progress
Editor’s note: This in-depth reporting project was originally published by Kansas City PBS/Flatland, a member of the KC Media Collective, which also includes Startland News, KCUR 89.3, American Public Square, The Kansas City Beacon, and Missouri Business Alert. Click here to read the original story. Revenue flows in faster than it gets disbursed for projects If you…
Film to promote Walt Disney’s historic Kansas City animation studio gets $10K boost
Efforts to restore the original Laugh-O-gram Studio building along Troost Avenue are getting a bump from a Missouri Humanities grant and a matching donation from a longtime local supporter of the arts in Kansas City. Thank You Walt Disney — a not-for-profit dedicated to the preservation and restoration of Walt Disney’s first animation studio, the…
Feds award $500K for Goodwill, LaunchCode jobs training effort through STEM Tech Challenge
Nearly a half-million dollars in federal funds are expected to help two local programs forge a new STEM-based job training initiative to help Kansas City-region job seekers find permanent high-wage careers in tech. U.S. Rep. Sharice Davids, D-Kansas, on Wednesday announced a $499,196 award from the U.S. Department of Commerce to Goodwill MoKan (Goodwill of…