The first year of Logistikbude

On 28.10.2021, the time had finally come: After some preparation, Jan, Patrik, Michael and Philipp sat at the notary and were able to officially found Logistikbude GmbH. The next two months until mid-January were then quite unspectacular and consisted primarily of waiting for bureaucratic processes and legal documents. In January, however, the place was registered, had a tax and operating number and had a template for offers including general terms and conditions and the wild card for every Scrabble game: order data processing contract.

The first few months were dedicated to acquiring customers. We are infinitely grateful for the trust of customers such as EcoCarrier, Fega & Schmitt, siemens and DB Schenker to be able to win. While we're on the subject of gratitude: From the very beginning, thanks to former colleagues at Fraunhofer IML received full support and were able to continue using our offices at IML during this time thanks to EXIST funding. This made it possible for us to concentrate fully on talking to potential customers and working on our product. In addition to the “tracking” starting point, customer feedback has led, for example, to exchange account management with automatic reconciliation, inventory management, status management and the ability to create delivery notes.

We also received a lot of positive feedback at the trade fairs where we appeared as a logistics shop for the first time. These included, among others, the LogiMAT in Stuttgart, the FachPack in Nuremberg and the Logistics Summit in Hamburg. Our annual and quarterly strategy meetings have been an important cornerstone of our growth right from the start. There, the previous quarter is critically assessed and the objectives and key results (OKRs) for the coming quarter are defined. After very intensive hours, the social part with a small team event is on the agenda at the end of the day. We did a lot of exciting things here during the year — from soccer golf to billiards to a joint escape from a dictator's office, of course only in the form of an escape room.

In May 2022, with the Fraunhofer Technology Transfer Fund (FTTF) was also the first investor on board and helped us a lot to understand how the “VC Game” works and which key figures are really important. We have always received very honest and direct feedback, which we really appreciate.

At the end of September, the next big step was on the cards: Since the EXIST funding expired, we had to leave the familiar walls of Fraunhofer IML and look for our own office. Here we are very grateful that we in Center for Entrepreneurship & Transfer (CET) the TU Dortmund have found a place and can exchange ideas with other founders there. However, in order to switch to CET, in addition to packing numerous boxes, the entire IT infrastructure had to be set up in-house and set up again. Then it was done and it was time for the four founders to say goodbye to all the great people at Fraunhofer IML over beer and baguette.

Finally, the most important development of the first year, even more important than development of the product, acquisition of customers and the first own office. This refers to the newly recruited employees in the booth. Right from the start, Carmen and Serhiy have been assisting us diligently as student assistants at Fraunhofer IML and we are very happy that they both accompanied us into the booth. Since summer 2022, Ramin has also been supporting the development of the software and since October Vanessa has also been completing the dev team. We are extremely happy to have everyone on board and are looking forward to other great events, such as our visit to the Christmas market or paddleboating together on Lake Phoenix!