Insider Brief
- Augment raised $25M in seed funding, led by 8VC, to develop Augie, an AI-powered logistics assistant that automates shipment coordination, workflow management, and communication for freight operators.
- The $900B freight industry faces inefficiencies with manual processes, and Augie helps shippers, brokers, and carriers streamline operations, reduce errors, and improve profitability in an industry with razor-thin 3% margins.
- Founded by Harish Abbott (Deliverr, acquired by Shopify for $2.1B), Augment aims to expand AI-driven automation across logistics, including warehousing, freight forwarding, and supply chain management.
PRESS RELEASE — Augment, the AI-driven logistics platform, has announced $25 million in seed funding led by 8VC. The company’s debut product, Augie, is an AI teammate for the freight industry, designed to collaborate and execute complex logistics tasks. It calls, emails, logs into systems, escalates issues, and manages workflows to streamline truckload (FTL), less-than-truckload (LTL), expedited, and drayage shipments. By automating execution, reducing errors, and increasing efficiency, Augie helps shippers, brokers, and carriers unlock greater profitability and operational scalability.
The $900B freight industry plays a crucial role in the U.S. economy but remains fragmented and inefficient. In the past three years, the industry has faced significant economic challenges. With 900,000 trucking companies and 20,000+ brokerages relying on manual communications to coordinate shipments — emails, phone calls, data entry, and document transfers, carriers and brokers are challenged by razor-thin 3% net margins and inconsistent service levels.
Harish Abbott, co-founder and CEO of Augment, previously founded Deliverr, the fulfillment platform acquired by Shopify for $2.1 billion in 2022. Drawing on his deep expertise in logistics, Abbott founded Augment to bring AI-driven productivity boosts to logistics companies.
“We are applying AI to logistics, one of the largest and most complex industries, to drive transformative change,” said Abbott. “Augie is like an assistant to every operator in the freight industry, Augie performs the tedious and mundane tasks so the operators can focus on the important and urgent.”
Augment is initially focused on the freight industry including last mile delivery. Over time, the company aims to extend its AI-powered productivity platform across warehousing, freight forwarding, car hauling, and supply chain management in the broader logistics industry.
“Our growth is fueled by a relentless focus on relationships, service, and execution, supported by best in class technology. We partnered with Augment to build a multi-functional AI assistant, giving our team another tool to spend more time on value-added parts of their jobs and delivering a better experience to our partners. The Augment team has exceeded our expectations as a partner, shadowing our reps in house, learning the business, and building solutions that make sense for our operation.” said Matt Pyatt, Founder & CEO of Arrive Logistics.
The founding team at Augment brings together exceptional technologists and experienced logistics operators. Artur Rivilis, CTO, has built scalable engineering systems and teams that power multi-billion dollar businesses. Art led all product and engineering at Deliverr. Most recently, he was VP of Engineering at Shopify.
Justin Hall, a seasoned transportation and logistics tech executive, serves as CCO at Augment to drive strategic growth and customer experience. Previously, he was Executive in Residence at 8VC, CEO of Primo Logistics, and CCO at YRC Worldwide, overseeing a $5B LTL and brokerage operation. He also led the sale of LPS to GlobalTranz as President.
“We were the first investors in Deliverr and Harish which was a big success. Augment’s an even bigger idea — one that parallels Palantir’s approach of understanding the workflow and knowledge ontology, to apply AI and solve critical problems. Harish is poised to build a generational company that brings productivity and intelligence to one of the largest industries in the world.” Joe Lonsdale, 8VC.
With this investment, Augment plans to accelerate the development of its productivity platform for logistics and expand its engineering and customer success teams. Augment has offices in San Francisco, Chicago and Toronto.
For more information, visit goaugment.com.
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About
Augment is an AI-driven logistics platform featuring Augie, an AI teammate for the freight industry designed to collaborate and execute complex logistics tasks. Co-founder and CEO, Harish Abbott, previously founded Deliverr, the fulfillment platform acquired by Shopify for $2.1 billion in 2022. Augment has raised $25M in funding to-date.
