Burlington, Mass.-based startup Weft is raising a seed round under $1 million, and Silicon Valley VC Andreessen Horowitz has already signed a check.
Weft's seed round is not yet closed, but the company is already planning to begin raising a Series A worth $5 million in the next few months.
According to Weft Co-founder and CEO Marc Held, the company has busy year ahead. Held told BostInno via email:
Next steps for us are to build the hell out of the product and sell [to] as many customers as we can! We've got some big things lined up with the telcos, too, which will help us get to the endgame pretty darn quick.
The startup provides an "air traffic control system" for precious cargo, with the ultimate aim of finding and fixing the bottlenecks in current shipping processes. Weft works by simply attaching a small piece of hardware to the valuable cargo in transit to receive real-time monitoring and analytics, allowing companies to check up on their shipments and see if there's a better way to get from point A to point B.
In addition to Andreessen Horowitz, new West Coast firm Data Elite is also participating in Weft's first round of financing. Data Elite is also providing the startup will space out in San Francisco (the company officially became bi-coastal last week, Held said), as well as access to high-profile Valley leaders like Facebook's head of analytics Ken Rudin.
Weft has also received funding from Boston angel investors, including Bridge Boys' Jeremy Levine, StarStreet Founder and CEO, and Drew Volpe, Locately Co-founder and CTO. Volpe also serves as one of the startup's advisors, alongside Level Up Analytics founder Jonathan Goldman and TapJoy VP of Engineering Sean Lindsey.
Bridge Boys' Levine explained to BostInno the rational behind their investment in Weft:
I've known Marc for over four years now, while he was working on Zazu and my early days with StarStreet. I've always known I'd love to work with him, and when I heard about Weft.io, we offered to invest on the spot. Whatever Marc did I would have loved to be a part of, but doesn't hurt that he's going after a huge problem with many different applications.
Weft has already brought a bunch of contractors on board, according to Held. "We've been working with Vodafone, Telefonica, and Etisalat on different initiatives. We're working with one of them to track all the vaccines throughout Africa," stated the CEO over email.
The startup plans to kick off a Series A fundraising round within the next few months and hopes to raise $5 million by the summer. Weft plans to move from its offices in Burlington to more permanent spot in Cambridge come the mid-2014 and build out its team to 15.
