All-electric parcel delivery company Hived, which works with the likes of Nespresso, John Lewis, Grubby, Candy Kittens and Minor Figures, has secured $42m (£31m) to take its logistics network nationwide.
The company – which was co-founded in 2021 by former Manchester City footballer Murvah Iqbal – raised the cash in a Series B funding round led by NordicNinja, which has backed logistics players including Bolt and Einride.
The funding will “accelerate Hived’s UK rollout, grow its engineering and data team, and scale development of its proprietary logistics intelligence platform”, the company said.
Hived said most existing logistics firms in the UK were “stuck retrofitting for e-commerce by bolting smart features onto fragmented, legacy systems”. By comparison, Hived has “built its parcel delivery network explicitly for e-commerce, from the ground up”, it said.
The company’s Hivedmind platform uses AI, real-time data, and modern systems architecture to connect retailers, warehouses, drivers and end customers through a single, integrated, fully synchronised end-to-end system.
“Retailers integrate directly with real-time warehouse sorting, while routing algorithms adapt to driver behaviour and real-world situations,” the company explained.
“All parcels are tracked live from depot to doorstep, and retailers get a holistic view of the entire journey via dashboards with geo-coded delivery photos, behavioural alerts, and fraud pattern detection, such as suspicious repeat orders to drive value and protect reputations,” it added.
Hived claims to be the world’s only end-to-end electric logistics network, which runs on “a 100% electric fleet”.
Since launch, Hived has delivered more than 6.5 million parcels across Greater London for its clients, with 99% on-time delivery. The company has grown in recent months to a headcount of more than 120, around a fifth of them having initially joined the company as drivers.
The funding will also be used to “accelerate hiring, fuel Hived’s expansion into several new UK cities, and further develop its proprietary models”, said Iqbal, Hived’s CEO.
“Parcel delivery should feel seamless, not stressful, but most of the industry is still running on systems that were never designed for e-commerce,” said Iqbal, who prior to launching Hived worked to grow her family’s restaurant, Archie’s, into a nationwide fast food chain.
“We’ve taken a fresh approach – rethinking everything from first principles, putting technology and experience at the centre, and proving there’s a better way to do this at scale. This raise is a huge step forward in making great delivery the norm, not the exception.”
Wex Venture Capital, Marunouchi Innovation Partners, Elemental Impact, Yamato Holdings, Future Back Ventures by Bain and Co, Rocketship VC and existing investors including Planet A also participated in the latest funding round.
The company is “doing what no one else in logistics has managed to do” said Tomosaku Sohara, managing partner at NordicNinja, “pair a truly outstanding consumer experience with deep operational control.
“They haven’t just improved delivery, they’ve reimagined it from the ground up, with technology as the foundation, not an afterthought. This means their technology isn’t just modern, it’s built to scale. We believe Hived has the platform, the team, the operational excellence and the momentum to reshape the future of parcel delivery and we’re proud to back them as they expand across the UK,” Sohara added.
In February, Hived announced it had ordered 11 electric HGVs from Mercedes to expand its network into the ‘middle mile’ as well as investing in EV charging infrastructure to support the rollout.
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