To further develop and scale its platform for local parcel acceptance communities, Cologne-based tech startup DropFriends is pleased to have secured a mid six-figure pre-seed funding round. Co-founder and CEO Martin Peters announced this at the Last Mile City Logistics trade fair in Berlin.
With its vision, strategy, and in-house technical development, the founding team convinced business angels Daniel Matuschewsky, Daniel Senf, Henry Flack, Markus Richter, Rainer Witt, and Randolf Schürmann. In addition, NRW.Bank participated in the funding round.
DropFriends offers a platform that enables anyone to set up or access a parcel shop within seconds via app and SaaS—regardless of the parcel service provider. “In two and a half months, we were able to generate more than 1,400 DropPoints. In Cologne and Hamburg, even more than the number of parcel lockers in each city,” says Martin Peters.
The startport team is also proud to look back on the startups from startport Batch #5. Alessandro Benassi supported the startup during its time in the program and says: “We are delighted with the founding team and congratulate them on the funding round. We are very pleased to see how the DropFriends founding team embraces diversity. This is a very important topic today, as diversity describes the differences and similarities among people or groups.”
“As a group of business angels, we are impressed by the founding team. DropFriends is a true tech company. They have the determination to make a positive contribution to climate protection and society. We are proud and pleased to support the team,” says business angel Markus Richter.
“In Germany, more than 4 billion parcels are shipped each year. And the market is growing rapidly. This creates significant problems for everyone involved when receiving parcels. Our goal is to enable parcels to be received on the first attempt while remaining fair to all parties,” emphasizes co-founder Yasmin Werner.
This is also confirmed by Mirco Meyer, Managing Director of DropFriends cooperation partner “baoo”: “With our app, for example, you choose new
headphones and then have them delivered to the desired DropPoint. This also increases our flexibility because we are spared tight delivery time windows and can significantly expand the delivery regions.”
With a focus on the growing number of online orders, the startup helps the CO2-emissions-intensive e-commerce sector operate more independently, but also more climate-friendly. “Every successful first-time delivery avoids additional trips for consumers and delivery drivers,” emphasizes Osamah Aldoaiss, co-founder and CTO.
About DropFriends
DropFriends was founded in Cologne at the end of 2019 by Yasmin Werner, Osamah Aldoaiss, and Martin Peters. DropFriends turns anyone into a parcel shop—regardless of the parcel service provider. These can then be selected to receive shipments via smartphone app, but also directly in online shop ordering processes or partner systems. The “Rheinland-Pitch Winter Finals” winner took part in the startport accelerator of the Port of Duisburg and currently has more than 1,500 independent DropPoints for parcel acceptance.