URB-E secures funding in hope of cutting emissions with containerised deliveries
URB-E, which wants to replace trucks with bikes, has announced a $5 million Series A round, and the appointment of Charles Jolley as CEO
URB-E, a compact container delivery network aiming to replace trucks with bikes has announced a $5 million Series A funding round alongside a new CEO.
The funding will be used to further scale URB-E’s local delivery networks in order to meet demand and expand to new cities looking to reduce traffic and emissions with a containerised delivery solution.
The containers are roll-on, roll-off and twenty folded containers can fit into a single parking space.
URB-E claims their system can replace an entire delivery van, reduce emissions by 100%, and increase driving efficiency by two-to-three times. It says that it can achieve this because of easier movement through crowded urban environments.
URB-E has already deployed a fleet of “pedal-powered” container systems, and says that it currently has over 1,800 containers moving 100,000 packages in New York City.
"Existing delivery solutions focus on putting more vehicles on the roads of our cities. URB-E is learning from the shipping world and containerizing to make pedal power more efficient than trucks," said Sven Etzelsberger, co-founder and Chief Technology Officer at URB-E. "URB-E's containers are better for couriers, companies, traffic, parking, and the environment."
Charles Jolley was also appointed as CEO. He has previously led both Platform and Android products while at Facebook and helped launch iCloud at Apple.
"From the start, I saw URB-E's potential to completely change how we think about local delivery," said Charles Jolley, the company's newly-appointed Chief Executive Officer. "On average, customers are moving from one package a week to one or two a day, and more delivery trucks — even electric vehicles at five times the cost of our solution — clearly aren't the right solution. Our network-based solution shrinks down containers and logistics for congested spaces to provide the most efficient option to meet the huge growth in last-mile delivery."