Kalon Venture Partners, Hlayisani Capital, Tritech Global and 4Decades Capital have invested R16.3m in a seed extension round in GoMetro, a logistics-tech platform.

Esquared Investments also participated, following on from their COVID Fund support in 2020.

“Kalon’s investment was motivated by the exceptional GoMetro team, as well as the innovative digitization of transport operations to better manage mobility. The GoMetro Fleet works with logistics providers’ existing investment in telematics, provides accurate route planning and ontime alerts, and saves them money in back-office costs and contract performance” said Kalon Venture Partners CEO Clive Butkow.

“We are excited to be an investor as this business continues to scale locally and globally.”

GoMetro will use the investment for key hires and as well as continue to invest in its innovative tech platform, product engineering and development.

GoMetro is a Mobility Management Super Platform that enables public transport and logistics operators to boost operational efficiency, future proof their services and tighten their competitiveness.

The solution improves the operations of hundreds of fleets around the world by providing the building blocks for the rapid development of mobility applications – getting people and goods to their destinations safely, predictably, and efficiently.

Whereas Fleet Management Systems have focused on asset management through telematics, GoMetro’s Fleet solution integrates with most major telematics providers to deliver activity management – enabling fleet co-ordination and operational visibility with capabilities that augment existing telematics investments. GoMetro’s key differentiator is that they target middle-of-themarket asset owners, a segment where large IT solution providers are not willing to fulfil due to their cost structure.

A solution that is an out of the box product that can deliver end-to-end multimodal fleet operations and mobility as a service platform serving riders, drivers, operators, and planners globally – with a highly scalable and repeatable model.

“There is a need in the logistics and freight industry to optimize routes and operations, predict arrivals more accurately and provide real-time insights across the supply chain, which legacy systems cannot provide. Utilization of the telematics and IoT, as well as other big data is challenging the industry to make data-led decisions with the aim to improve overall margins whilst optimizing overall service output,” CEO of GoMetro, Justin Coetzee said.

“By using our mobility management platform and digitizing their entire fleet, operators can save up to 30% in operating costs by increasing overall vehicle utilization, controlling excess mileage and managing back-office costs. We have also seen our customers increase the certainty and accuracy of their delivery windows by 50%,” he added.