Logistics is an extremely competitive segment, with high operating costs, financial risks, and high capital investment that end up putting pressure on the sector’s margins. Rolling through a still quite analog and inefficient Road, the logtech Freto, which acts as a digital carrier for industries with low and medium added value, showed a 45% growth in its gross margin in the year 2024, also achieving business profitability.
Six years in the market, the approach found by the company was neither fully digital nor entirely old-school, as CEO Thomas Gautier likes to emphasize, explaining that the sector opens doors to technology when it sees value in practical knowledge transmitted by professionals with real experience in the pains of their businesses. So far, more than R$ 13 billion in freight have been transported, moving more than 106 million tons across Brazil.
One of the main logistics bottlenecks that Freto solves with innovation is the subcontracting of road freights. ‘Hiring a large carrier and this same company subcontracting another carrier is what we call outsourcing, quartering, and even quintupling. The result is the loss of control for the contractor, sometimes total, of the goods being transported. With Freto, however, the industry has 100% visibility of the operations of the carrier that handled the cargo,’ explains Gautier.
It’s like Freto acts as the Uber of industries’ logistics, maintaining a qualified base of drivers, and capable of assuming all stages of transportation for its contractors – that’s where technology comes in. Last year, the company grew its fleet base to 217 thousand vehicles, serving over 3,300 cities in Brazil with a 99.9% delivery effectiveness index (SLA). In 2024, the number of trips increased by 15%, surpassing 55 thousand hires, growth stemming from continuous process improvement and the expansion of its customer base.
Focusing on steel mills, cement plants, and other suppliers of raw materials for civil construction, Freto saw its operations double in Minas Gerais, driven by high demand in the mining sector. In 2024, the company invested in a new branch in the state. In addition to the Southeast, the logtech is also growing in the Northeast, a region that will continue to be part of the growth plans for 2025.
Scaling Phase
Investors who also liked Freto’s performance and ability to solve financial issues were its investors (including Edenred Capital Partners Fund and families Galló, Corrêa da Silva, and Stumpf) who in early 2024 invested R$ 12.3 million in a follow-on, totaling R$ 34.8 million invested so far.
In the early years, the company focused on the MVP (Minimum Viable Product), testing the solution and validating the product’s viability. This period was crucial to understand if the idea really made sense in the market. The goal was to validate the concept and adjust the initial versions of the product, without losing sight of user needs and market demands.
“In 2021, we went through an important transition. We moved from the incubation phase to a more structured and independent business model. This change was marked by the quest to solve sector pains and the creation of a scalable platform capable of growing and staying in the market in the long run. This process required a lot of planning, reflection, and continuous adjustments but was crucial to establish what we call “viable business models,” which laid the foundation for our future,” says Gautier.
In 2024, Freto concluded an important stage of opening up to the market, testing different ways to generate revenue, understanding the costs involved, and mapping how to make the model sustainable in the long term. Always keeping a close eye on the excellence of the service provided, safety in operations, and the reduction of costs and profitability of each client, in every operation.
For 2025, the CEO believes that the economy will bring significant challenges to the sector. “The high dollar and high interest rates are two of the main tension vectors. The unstable exchange rate can impact the cost of imported inputs and raw materials, making price predictions difficult and increasing the pressure on operational costs. Furthermore, maintaining high interest rates tends to make credit more expensive, making it difficult for companies, which will need to adopt agile and innovative strategies to minimize the impacts of these economic variables, focusing on operational efficiency and strict cost management to maintain their competitiveness,” concludes.
About Freto
To simplify road logistics, moving truckers, Freto is a digital carrier where the best truckers and the best loads from industries meet. An organization that was born 100% digital with technology and 100% roots, from the solid know-how of a team that has years of experience on Brazilian highways, focused on combating inefficiencies of the traditional model. Operating as a logtech, the company eliminates fleet subcontracting, increases the base of truckers, and with technology takes over all stages of transportation. These loads are published by large producers of grains, sugar, steel mills, paper and pulp manufacturers, and cement companies, who use Freto’s fleet of 217 thousand vehicles to distribute their products throughout Brazil. The freights can be accepted in up to 1 minute, gaining agility, strengthening operational fronts, and reducing operating costs. Among the main pillars of the company are the excellence of the service provided, safety in operations, and reduction of costs and profitability of each client.
Since its foundation in 2018 until the end of 2024, the company:
– Moved more than 106 million tons of cargo;
– Accumulated over R$13 billion in effectively contracted freights and R$ 2.7 million in contracted loads.
