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Entrepreneur Karan Shaha’s family members, who were running their own businesses, faced many challenges while booking trucks for transporting their goods.

“I got to know from some of my family members who run steel plants and rice mills that booking trucks are a hassle as the rates keep fluctuating and trust issues with transporters, among others,” he says.

After realising the inconveniences in the logistics business, IIT graduates Karan and Vikas Chandrawat launched Vahak, an online transport marketplace, in 2019.

“Vikas and I did our research and launched our own transportation company to provide ground level transportation. During that time, we interacted with over 1,000 transport companies and lorry owners and got to know about the deep rooted issues in this market,” Karan says.

Bengaluru-based Vahak allows client businesses to book lorry online, helps in transport business branding, and network expansion. It offers a live transport marketplace app to help client businesses directly connect with trusted transporters and truck owners across India.

Recently, in July, Vahak raised $5 million in pre-Series A funding round led by RTP Global with participation from Luxor Capital and Leo Capital.

Online transport community

Speaking with YS, Karan explains that Vahak is essentially a community and a marketplace for transport companies and lorry owners.

“Currently, a major portion of the transportation business is done through telephone calls, which results in a lot of confusion, delays, and losses. At the same time, many of the transporters do not have an online presence, which results in a trust gap in the market,” he adds.

Vahak helps the client businesses reach out to lorry owners through its application within seconds. It also helps transporters to create an online brand for their business and generate leads by leveraging its pan-India network.

Karan explains that while onboarding, the startup ensures the documents of the truck owners are verified and the vehicles are insured in order to build trust among the stakeholders. He adds that Vahak’s aim is to enable online financial transactions for client companies and truck owners.

Business and more

The startup claims it does not charge the vehicle owners or the users for its services, and is in a pre-revenue stage. It also reveals that going forward, the startup will provide financial services such as loans, insurance to the truckers to earn its revenue. According to the startup, it will take at least nine to 12 months of time for them to provide these financial services.

Vahak claims to have developed a network of more than five lakh transport companies, and is serving more than 8,000 locations across the country. The network now covers major transport and logistics hubs across India such as New Delhi, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Pune, Kolkata, Chennai, Visakhapatnam, Raipur, Bhilai, Bhopal, Lucknow, Bengaluru, Kochi, Chandigarh, Vapi, Surat, Nagpur, Patna, and Indore.

It claims to be managing more than 10,000 daily active loads.

According to a report by Research and Markets, the logistics market in India is forecasted to grow at a CAGR of 10.5 percent between 2019 and 2025.

Bengaluru-based logistics giant BlackBuck also offers an online marketplace for trucking. Earlier in July, the startup raised its Series E funding of $67 million and entered the coveted unicorn club.

Vahak recently raised its pre-Series A and is looking to deploy its funds for strengthening its team and technological capabilities. It is also aimed at increasing its network to over two million transport companies and clock in $1 billion annual GMV in the next 12 months.

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