Before he became an entrepreneur, Julian Alvarez dreamed of becoming an NBA All-Star.
“I didn’t fall on the right side of the equation of height. I stalled out at about 5’9, which made it impossible for me to become a basketball player,” Alvarez said. “If I would have not become an entrepreneur, my dream was always to become an NBA player, but athletic ability and height kind of prevented that from happening.”
The NBA’s loss ended up being a gain for the Seattle-area tech ecosystem. Alvarez is now the co-founder and CEO of Logixboard, a startup that makes customer experience software for freight forwarders. The five-year-old company moved to Seattle from Miami in 2019 to join the Techstars Seattle accelerator. Since then, the company has raised rounds of $13 million last year and $32 million in January, and Alvarez said the company now has almost 80 employees between full-time workers and contractors.
Co-founder and CEO of Logixboard
Age: 32
Hometown: Los Angeles
Current residence: South Lake Union and Miami
Education: Undergrad at Carnegie Mellon University
Interests outside of work: Basketball, football and traveling. “I am a huge, huge foodie…Everything that tastes incredibly delicious. Honestly, I love Peruvian food. I love Japanese cuisine. But I think Peruvian food, for me, is probably my favorite.”
Freight forwarders work with shippers, finding them space on the likes of airplanes, ships and trucks to help them move goods. Alvarez describes these businesses as low-asset service providers, as the freight forwarders themselves usually don’t own the modes of transport but just manage the complexity of moving goods. Logixboard’s technology automates reporting, provides a central messaging system and allows users to upload documents.
In large part, Logixboard owes its existence to Julian’s brother Juan, also a co-founder of Logixboard and the vice president of customer experience. Juan had worked at a freight forwarder and was constantly bombarded with calls and emails from shipping clients who wanted to know the location of their goods.
Juan developed a manual way to answer clients’ questions through spreadsheets but couldn’t do that for everyone, according to Julian, and the two realized there was no software solution to help freight forwarders. Julian decided to partner with Juan, and the brothers launched their company.
As for figuring out who would be better in what role, Julian said the two brothers discussed their responsibilities with the company over dinner. According to Julian, Juan is better-equipped to obsess over customers given his past working for a freight forwarder, while the CEO duties better fit Julian’s skills.
“We started off being really small. It was the two of us,” Julian Alvarez said. “At early-stage startups, ultimately everybody ends up working on everything.”
Alvarez said Seattle has been a great place to build and grow Logixboard given the strong enterprise software presence in the region. In addition to tech giants like Amazon and Microsoft, companies like Google and Facebook parent Meta have large teams in the Puget Sound area. Alvarez added that the Seattle tech community has embraced the company, and Logixboard has found strong mentors like Chris DeVore, founding managing partner at Founders Co-op, and Jon Gelsey, former CEO of Auth0.
Despite Logixboard’s fundraising successes so far, the company is trying to focus on long-term value over short-term vanity metrics. Alvarez said the company aims to create real value for freight forwarders through its product and building a company that will be successful for 10 years and not just the next quarter.
The Seattle area also has many people with deep logistics experience, especially given the presence of global e-commerce powerhouse Amazon. A host of logistics and shipping startups in the area, meanwhile, have been attracting big bets from investors. Seattle-based Convoy, which makes technology to connect shippers and carriers, recently upped its value to $3.8 billion after securing $260 million in new funding. Seattle-based e-commerce shipping startup Shipium raised $27.5 million in April, while Seattle-based warehousing startup Flexe quietly raised $67.9 million in April as well, according to documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
According to Alvarez, about 40% of Logixboard’s workers are based in the Seattle area. The company was looking for a new office space in the Seattle area at the time of its $13 million round last year but has put that on hold given the uncertainty around the Covid-19 pandemic.
Alvarez said working remotely has worked well for Logixboard, but the challenge is making sure employees feel connected without seeing one another in person regularly. To strengthen employee bonds, the company recently had an off-site in Mexico for employees. Logixboard also uses Mystery, a virtual events platform headquartered in Seattle, and Alvarez said the company tries to have fun, interactive activities once every couple of weeks.
“We do have a goal of having an office and a headquarters in Seattle, but right now we still have the discussion and effort of opening up an office space on hold,” Alvarez said.
