GoMetroa South African technology company active in the fleet management space, has raised £9 million (~$11.4 million) in a Series A funding round led by Zenobē Energy, a strategic investor known for financing and operating electric buses.
Zenobē Energy is also involved in large-scale wind farm battery projects, with the UK’s National Grid among its valued customers (notably, the London-based company recently secured $750 million investment by KKR, intended to finance fleet electrification). The fleet electrification platform, which finances large electric buses and trucks in the UK, Australia and New Zealand and has interests in the US, manages and finances around 25% of the UK’s total electric bus fleet
Recognizing the importance of strong data quality to drive funding is behind Zenobē Energy’s lead investment in logistics optimization software specialist GoMetro. As such, this partnership — Zenobē Energy’s electric transportation-as-a-service model and GoMetro’s multi-OEM platform, Bridge — aims to enhance the capabilities and services offered to Zenobē’s extensive customer base.
Other investors in the round include new backers Futuregrowth, ESquared Ventures, Kalon Venture Partners and angel investor Greg Fury. Existing investors such as 4 Decades Capital, Hlayisani Capital and Tritech Global participated.
GoMetro serves as a SaaS fleet management technology platform that focuses on vehicle data through Bridge, its flagship product that acts as a telemeter and data aggregator. Regardless of the make or model of the vehicle – be it Mercedes, BYD or Yutong – Bridge consolidates all relevant data of these vehicles into a unified platform, GoMetro founder and CEO Justin Coetzee he told TechCrunch in an interview. Bridge’s flexibility ensures that fleet managers can access and analyze data without being limited by the disparate telematics systems associated with different OEMs.
As a civil engineer, Coetzee started GoMetro after recognizing the inadequacy of data available in South Africa for planning transport networks. This realization came from his involvement in the construction of bus and train systems during the 2010 World Cup, the most famous soccer tournament. In 2014, Coetzee took a major step by creating a chatbot that informed people about train arrival times, laying the foundation for what GoMetro has evolved into today.
“During this time, I learned a lot about transport, technology, data and what would happen if you could bring mobile phones, the internet, connectivity and the cloud into transport systems. And this is ultimately the genesis of the business. My train was late. So I made an app that would tell me when it was coming,” Coetzee said on the call.
“We then moved into buses and minibus taxis in South Africa, which was adopted by the national government to develop bus systems and integrate the minibus sector, where we built tracking solutions and fleet management solutions before moving into vans during the pandemic. . “
This strategic move, including a push into the EV segment, has contributed significantly to GoMetro’s business growth. It currently has a network of more than 15,000 vehicles (including 1,000 electric vehicles) and partnerships with 60 trucking and logistics companies.
The nine-year-old technology company, which raised about $1.5 million in seed funding in 2016, plays a critical role in data management for logistics operators in South Africa. Meanwhile, in the UK, most of its revenue comes from specializing in the management of electric vehicles and buses. Telematics tailored to electric buses address the shortcomings of older technologies designed for diesel engines, according to Coetzee. And as heavy vehicles shift to electrification, Cape Town-based GoMetro wants to lead the way with its pioneering OEM-agnostic electric vehicle telematics, according to Coetzee.
“The biggest change in the transportation sector is the transition to EVs across the spectrum. And so we think there’s an incredible opportunity for us to build cutting-edge breakthrough technology that helps manage electric buses and trucks better,” said the CEO. “As we help bus operators and logistics managers in the UK plan for electrification, we will be rolling out this platform in South Africa and the rest of Africa as models become available.”
Justin Coetzee (Founder, GoMetro). Image Credits: GoMetro
Fleet owners typically rely on a dot on a map from their existing telematics provider, managing operations by contacting drivers for updates or checking a document map. In addition to its focus on EVs, Coetzee says what sets GoMetro apart from platforms such as now-defunct WhereIsMyTransport is the ability to allow customers to enable any telematics unit, not limited to their own, and consolidate all fleets and subcontracted assets into a unified virtual cloud. The company then leverages its ETA algorithms to identify bottlenecks in customer operations. For every truck on the road, GoMetro applies rules that determine when and where it should arrive, alerts the fleet operator when deviations occur, and ensures prompt attention to any delays or problems.
GoMetro’s technology actively delivers tangible value to its customers by addressing a critical challenge: efficiently extracting data from vehicles to improve operational performance. This, in turn, helps its customers save time, reduce costs, minimize risks and optimize fuel consumption, positively impacting their performance.
Bridge operates as an API service, using a pay-per-use model. Additionally, it offers various products on a monthly subscription basis, such as the Connected Tire Kit, which incorporates Bluetooth, temperature and pressure sensing. a smart camera system. and a data center that facilitates data transmission.
In the last 12 months, GoMetro has doubled in revenue. Coetzee, without elaborating, says the company’s next goal is to triple its current revenue by the end of next year. Expanding its fleet of services will put it on track to achieve this goal. According to the CEO, GoMetro is looking to integrate more than 2,000 electric vehicles and 50,000 diesel vehicles on its platform next year.
In addition to using the Series A funding to strengthen its operations in the UK, Europe and South Africa, GoMetro is further focusing on expanding into the US, Latin America and Australia, markets where Zenobē will have a presence next 12 months. In the interview, Coetzee also noted that the company is looking at the Middle East, particularly Dubai and Saudi Arabia. “Many of the same fleet management challenges and problems that we see exist in these markets,” he said.
“We are also working very closely with vehicle OEMs to bring our expertise and expertise now in data management, data aggregation and clouds for vehicles to support them at the factory level. So we will use the funding to grow our engineering teams, distribution management and partner teams and invest in driving electric bus and truck management,” added the CEO.
“We are thrilled that African technology has been recognized globally. a market leader in a city like London, which is renowned for its public transport systems and excellence, has partnered with a technology business based out of Cape Town. And I think that just validates the talent and the hunger that African tech companies have to tackle global problems and have a global impact.”
