Ten maritime corporations have become the latest names to join Motion Ventures, a venture capital fund with the industry’s largest corporate consortium.
The companies include Lloyd’s Register, MarineTraffic, Meratus, Stolt-Nielsen, ShipsFocus, Jurni Capital, Taiship, Pangaea Logistics, Neptune Lines and Vineta Ventures.
“The tension to innovate, while accelerating profitability and product market fit in the current startup economy, makes it even more challenging for the maritime industry to meaningfully scale the right solutions. We’re operating in one of the most complex sectors for any founder to navigate – startups not only have to must win several siloes across the value chain even before being battle-tested by the market. It’s why we expanded our corporate consortium with capabilities that would support our portfolio companies to fuel the golden age of maritime supply chains,” said Shaun Hon, Founder and General Partner of Motion Ventures.
Motion Ventures’ corporate consortium now has the backing of 15 maritime companies, including Wilhelmsen, HHLA Next, MOL PLUS, IMC Ventures and Signal Ventures. To date, no other maritime fund has had as much participation from conglomerates in the industry.
The 10 new corporates added to Motion Ventures’ portfolio will introduce new industry capabilities and strategic geographic value to startups. For example, maritime’s longest-standing ship classification society Lloyd’s Register brings over 260 years of maritime expertise to startups solving challenges related to decarbonisation, safety, and seafarer well-being. MarineTraffic offers startups fresh opportunities to leverage live vessel intelligence and data.
The consortium’s geographic reach also now spans Singapore, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Greece, UK, Denmark, Germany, Norway, Netherlands and the US.
Motion Ventures has invested in startups across the spectrum of the maritime value chain with solutions developed for voyage optimisation, crewing, procurement management, supply chain workflow management and more. Companies have included Freightify, Everimpact and Greywing among others.
The fund is evaluating startups to deploy further capital during 2023. Founders solving ambitious maritime and supply chain challenges are encouraged to reach out to the team.
Chakib Abi-Saab, Chief Technology and Innovation Officer, Lloyd’s Register said: “Lloyd’s Register’s participation in Motion Ventures highlights our ongoing commitment to digital transformation in the maritime industry. Joining the corporate consortium gives us yet another opportunity to support startups in a fresh way as they solve some of the biggest challenges, such as decarbonisation, increased safety, and improving the well-being of seafarers across the world.”
Motion Ventures pioneered the corporate consortium fund as a way to bring together industry leaders with a mutual interest in innovation adoption via an investment fund. Startups benefit from strategic capital which gives them access to insights from corporates to help them build their solutions with the industry context in mind. Meanwhile, corporate investors can access opportunities to shape new products and technologies, which could drive more value into their own operations.
Motion Ventures’ corporate consortium includes the following 15 companies:
- HHLA Next
- IMC Ventures
- Lloyd’s Register
- MarineTraffic
- Meratus
- MOL PLUS
- Neptune Lines
- Pangaea Logistics
- ShipsFocus
- SignalVentures
- Stolt-Nielsen
- JurniCapital
- Taiship
- VinetaVentures
- Wilhelmsen
