2017 Under the Radar: TradeLanes eyes Midwestern Ag as future clients

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.

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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.