Chinese online road transport operator Tiandihui, Italy’s Vailog set up US$728m fund to expand logistics network

Shanghai Tiandihui Supply Chain Management, the mainland’s largest online road transport operator, has teamed with Italy’s Vailog that specialises in development and investment of logistic properties, to launch a 5 billion yuan fund (US$728 million) to build 20 logistics hubs across the mainland.

Xu Shuibo, founder and chief executive of Tiandihui, said on Saturday that the priority for the start-up was to turn profitable this year, adding that the company will use the funds to build facilities to better handle cargo flows for clients.

“We are still focusing on network expansion to stay ahead of the competition,” he said.

Tiandihui whose online platform matches lorries with cargo in 60 mainland cities, expects to double transactions value to more than 200 billion yuan in 2018, Xu said.

For the first half of 2018, more than 100 billion yuan of transactions were conducted via its platform covering 60 mainland cities and 300 routes. The company plans to increase the number of routes to 1,000 over the coming few years.