Eyes on the Road
I’m tremendously proud of the team at CargoSense. Over the last year (and more), we’ve been in the trenches, building a product line that’s unlike anything our market has ever seen. It’s been immensely satisfying to see the reactions of our customers and hear about the impact we’re having on their businesses. We provide a level of insight that they’ve never seen before – and we’ve worked really hard to wrap it up in a user experience that’s a joy to use. (Not to put too fine a point on it, but that’s not exactly standard fare for, ahem, enterprise logistics software.)
I’m thankful for the technical challenges, choices, and tools that we’ve encountered building CargoSense; they’ve been a great opportunity for my own growth as a software developer – and as a CTO that’s focused on building the right architecture and partnerships to succeed.
Today we announced a little bit of news. Our funding by CIT GAP and NDA.
Announcing funding is often a garish affair; there are plenty of reasons certain types of companies (or companies at certain phases of their lifetime) shouldn’t take money, yet they do – and their gleeful announcements make their naïveté all the more striking. Funding is too often treated as the goal by startups, rather than the means to a better end – adding the capacity to help meet your real goals, and building useful relationships with people that can help you along the way.
While I have a tremendous amount of respect for bootstrapped startups that go the distance solo, our business doesn’t fit a SaaS lifestyle mould for a number of reasons (the sensor hardware component is the most obvious reason, but also the type of market, the sales cycle, etc). Funding makes sense for us as we ramp up – and this investment has helped validate our long-term vision of the market.
Today more than anything I’m excited to be a part of a team that’s not satisfied with just “running out the clock,” and that rather than obsess over the length of “roadway,” keeps their eyes on the road. I’m happy that the funding feels right, and that now we can push the gas pedal even harder to get where we’re going.
(Turns up the radio.)