GenLogs, which is deploying a nationwide network of roadside sensors to track movement of trucks, said this week it has raised over $6 million, including a seed round in April co-led by Autotech Ventures and New York-based Steel Atlas. Other investors include Midlothian, Va.-based Venture53, Washington, D.C.-based JHH Ventures, a family office, TitletownTech, Plug and Play Ventures, BBQ Capital and ASC Ventures.
The Arlington, Va., startup’s CEO, Ryan Joyce, told Citybiz.co that the GenLogs founding team has a background in the U.S. intelligence community, conducting counter-terrorism operations across the globe where “we leveraged distributed sensors, disparate datasets, and human sources to uncover and disrupt terrorist attacks.”
Fraud-Fighting Capability
“We apply a similar methodology to domestic trucking in the United States now to help combat fraud and theft, while giving better intelligence to freight brokers to make more informed decisions and boost revenues,” said Joyce, who served as a manager in the U.S. State Department for 14 years.
Besides Joyce, GenLogs’ founders include Joe Sherman, a data scientist and Virginia Tech researcher, and Blake Balch, a former foreign service officer in the State Department. Sherman is chief technology officer at GenLogs, while Balch heads partnerships.
GenLogs’ sensors collect real-time data on truck movements and extract key details, such as the U.S. Department of Transportation and motor carrier numbers. The data it collects can be used to fight fraud and fragmentation, a key industry problem that results in difficulty in securing the right truck at the right time. The company says it also provides visibility into more than 250,000 shipper locations, their lanes and load volumes, all of which arm freight brokers with the data needed to engage and secure new business.
Computer Vision
“The entire market wants comprehensive data on all truck patterns, but placing sensors on four million trucks is a pipe dream,” said Joyce. “Using a proprietary roadside sensor network enables us to collect all that same data on the four million trucks without needing their permission.” Joyce said the company filters out all private vehicles and does not collect data on individuals.
GenLogs has accomplished a gargantuan task of deploying sensors along major interstates and highways from “coast-to-coast” in the continental United States. “Some of the early struggles came from figuring out how to capture video from three separate definition cameras and then correlating the three distinct images as one unique truck before extracting all relevant data,” Joyce said, pointing out that the difficulty was compounded by the fact that the trucks were at all times zooming past at 70 miles per hour.
The data was initially transmitted back to the company over limited communications networks but Joyce said GenLogs has since “developed specialized AI software that accomplishes this reliably,” allowing it to collect data on tens of millions of trucks, trailers, and other equipment over the last year.
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SaaS Platform
“GenLogs has developed the world’s most robust freight intelligence platform that fundamentally changes how freight brokers, carriers and shippers operate across the U.S., said New York-based Steel Atlas’ Talal Attieh, who has a seat on GenLog’s board. “Their technology provides essential visibility into real-time trucking needs. GenLogs’ mission aligns directly with our thesis of eliminating volatility across the industrial value chain.”
Joyce said GenLogs has rolled out it’s a SaaS freight Intelligence product to “a dozen customers and have a waitlist that is growing every day.” The months-old Freight Intelligence platform provides real-time insights into available trucking capacity.
GenLogs plans to use the new funding to expand its sensor network and develop a suite of computer vision models to provide customers an “omniscient view” of the transportation industry.
