- Ecommerce enablement technology ShipBob announced that it has raised $68 million in primary funding led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2
Ecommerce enablement technology ShipBob announced that it has raised $68 million in primary funding. The new funding round will enhance the company’s capabilities to bring high-quality fulfillment to more customers, fuel growth, expand its software platform, and scale its global fulfillment network.
This round of funding was led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2. And prior investors include Menlo Ventures, Bain Capital Ventures, Hyde Park Venture Partners, Hyde Park Angels, and Y Combinator. SoftBank Investment Advisers Managing Partner, Ervin Tu, will be joining the ShipBob board of directors.
Based out of Chicago offers simple, fast and affordable fulfillment for thousands of ecommerce businesses through their full-stack technology and ten fulfillment centers across the US, Canada and Europe. Launched in 2014, ShipBob co-founders Dhruv Saxena Divey Gulati participated in the Y Combinator startup accelerator. These two entrepreneurs saw a need for more efficient shipping in the marketplace for small businesses.
ShipBob can be integrated with all of the leading ecommerce platforms and marketplaces such as Amazon, Walmart, Shopify, BigCommerce, Wix, and Squarespace. And these integrations enable nearly all emerging brands to provide fast shipping to their customers without having to handle fulfillment themselves. Beyond fulfillment, partners, and integrations like returns management, inventory management and financing solutions can be activated in ShipBob’s apps marketplace in order to provide brands with a one-stop shop to manage their business.
And to enable these capabilities, ShipBob built their entire fulfillment technology stack: from the merchant-facing software to its warehouse management system (WMS). ShipBob’s WMS is used within all ten of its fulfillment centers across the United States, Canada and Europe — which allows them to stand up new facilities in weeks instead of quarters. And ShipBob expects to open two more US facilities in Q4 and another ten facilities across North America, Europe, Asia and Australia in 2021.
When the COVID-19 pandemic started, ShipBob has seen an even greater acceleration in new customers needing their solution, and their 9-figure business is growing over 100% year-over-year and is cash flow positive. And to support this influx in demand, ShipBob has opened six new fulfillment centers since April, including their two international locations. Plus they have hired hundreds of new fulfillment associates over the last few months and will hire hundreds more leading up to the holiday peak season.
KEY QUOTES:
“When we started this company, our mission was to build ShipBob into the default ecommerce logistics solution for all direct-to-consumer brands around the world. That mission has not only remained, but has become even more important with the accelerated digital shifts happening across all industries today.”
— Dhruv Saxena, CEO and co-founder of ShipBob
“We are democratizing best-in-class fulfillment for thousands of ecommerce brands who are shipping millions of items per month. Bringing in additional investment from a global leader like SoftBank will allow us to expand our fulfillment center footprint across the United States and the rest of the world even faster.”
— Divey Gulati, President and co-founder of ShipBob
“Logistics is an enormous industry that has seen rapid growth alongside ecommerce adoption. ShipBob is leveraging data and innovative technology and operations to grow its business and drive significant increases in revenue and profits. The company is on track to be the market-leading solution for SMB and larger merchants around the world.”
— Ervin Tu, Managing Partner at SoftBank Investment Advisers
