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Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

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Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#151

Post by dopamean »

adaml_623 wrote: post #145
WisNorCan wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They got caught in the same thing that happened to Flexport and others in the freight industry. Price per shipment cratered -> Revenue cratered. (They make a % of each shipment) -> Losses spiked up. (Because they had fixed cost) Flexport had a burn run rate of $600M a year . Convoy had less burn but also less in the bank. https://www.theinformation.com/briefings/flexport-revenue-dr...

I thought Flexport was still hiring a month or two ago

They were and the ceo commented on twitter that he had no idea why that was and then rescinded offers to people who were starting the next week.

Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#152

Post by h2odragon »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #136
thegginthesky wrote: post #74

I work for one of their competitors and I can empathize with them. My thoughts goes to all the employees and their families. The Freight business is collapsing after an unrealistic high during the pandemic. Since April 2022, revenue per load has decreased to about 70%, this means less ways to generate a profit under the same headcount. We also saw a decrease in volume as companies overstocked and consumer spending ha…

This just made me realize that things are back in stock regularly again. I suppose it happened slowly so I didn't notice, but shortages seem to be totally gone and things are back to 2019 stock levels.

The shelves may have stuff one them, but there's like 4 bags of each of 6 brands, instead of 24 brands.

Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#153

Post by sethammons »

gist wrote: post #77
cityofdelusion wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last time I moved a car halfway across the U.S. I just went online, submitted a request, got a quote, paid and it was all done. It was about as friction-free as something like that can be. Just need to use a direct carrier like Intercity, NOT a broker. Brokers have infested Google SEO.

> Just need to use a direct carrier like Intercity, NOT a broker. So because you mentioned it I just called them for transporting by enclosed carrier on the east coast between 2 cities. High end car enclosed carrier. Intercity wanted $1995 for the same transport that the car dealer (a high end car dealer well established no less) want $1600 dollars for. Intercity essentially said 'busy time of year etc etc'. Didn't g…

Their point is that brokers are generally terrible. That you found an ok one is cool. We went through a broker for moving our possessions from California to Montana. Worst professional experience of our lives. They kept our shit at some lot for around six weeks while they tried to job out to other freight providers because the first one didn't work out. Or the next. Or the next. Finally they got someone who should have been on medical disability to drive our stuff up after the broker declared bankruptcy. Not sure how that worked exactly. I had to threaten to drive down there to pick up my own shit and load it into a uhaul or two.

Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#154

Post by BWStearns »

adaml_623 wrote: post #145
WisNorCan wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They got caught in the same thing that happened to Flexport and others in the freight industry. Price per shipment cratered -> Revenue cratered. (They make a % of each shipment) -> Losses spiked up. (Because they had fixed cost) Flexport had a burn run rate of $600M a year . Convoy had less burn but also less in the bank. https://www.theinformation.com/briefings/flexport-revenue-dr...

I thought Flexport was still hiring a month or two ago

They had that weird moment where they fired/rescinded a bunch of new hires after Peterson came back and basically said "oh yeah we weren't supposed to be hiring."

Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#155

Post by sushid »

busterarm wrote: post #137
vogt wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>CEO said there'll be no severance or healthcare. Classy. Learning a lot about how certain people treat their employees during these last couple of admittedly insane years. Good for future reference, I guess - though not much solace now. I feel for the employees. Edit: Wow, more responses than I thought! I admit that the tone of my comment was too reactionary, but my opinion stands. I won't modify the original commen…

Startups are not established businesses. They are inherently risky ventures. If you want to be coddled and showered with benefits, go join a Fortune 500. Startups are not for you.

I didn't realize wanting healthcare while getting let go from a company I worked for was desiring to be "coddled."

Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#156

Post by llm_nerd »

andlarry wrote: post #134
hotpotamus wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You know, it's rather impressive the lengths the US will goto to avoid socialized/single-payer health plans (for anyone who isn't in the military or poor or over 65 at least). That sounds rather cockamamy to me.

Medicare: 65,748,297 people enrolled [0] Medicaid and CHIP: 85,614,581 people enrolled [1] Military: 9.5 million people covered [2] The US has not one but two of the largest single payer health insurance programs in the world. Medicare alone has more people enrolled than any European country's single payer programs other than Germany (pop 83,294,633) and the UK (pop 67,736,802). [0] https://medicareadvocacy.org/medic…

I don't think having discrete programs for subsets of the population is single-payer. Single-payer to my understanding means that the health system itself has a single payer. Having the government pay for some patients and a myriad of insurance plans covering the bulk of other patients is not single payer.

As they said, it is bizarre the lengths the US will go to to maintain its layered system. It seems purpose built to screw people over.

Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#157

Post by pxx »

ctvo wrote: post #48
bradleybuda wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think the executives are making anything from this? It's a startup, it ran out of money, it failed, there is nothing left. Joining a startup is risky.

Shutting down 3 months earlier, but everyone getting severance is an option. Let's not pretend it had to happen this way because it's a startup. They made the decision, if true, to use up every cent clinging on trying to find an exit or more runway.

The very nature of a startup, especially one funded like this, means that your whole existence is predicated on the hopes that you make it big.

As such, spending your last cent to try to find a lifeline makes far more sense than calling it quits early. It's also certainly not in the interests of investors to just call things off.

Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#158

Post by andrewmutz »

bart_spoon wrote: post #86
benced wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ex-Convoy employee here: if a company is shutting down, it obviously can't provide severance. It's not a matter of class or not.

If things are dire enough to close up shop now, they probably were dire enough to close up shop 2 months ago, and you can use the cash to give your employees some runway for finding new employment.

Probably they used those two months to try to find a buyer for the company

Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#159

Post by oh_sigh »

sushid wrote: post #155
busterarm wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Startups are not established businesses. They are inherently risky ventures. If you want to be coddled and showered with benefits, go join a Fortune 500. Startups are not for you.

I didn't realize wanting healthcare while getting let go from a company I worked for was desiring to be "coddled."

You can buy healthcare on the free market.

And you aren't being "let go" - the entire company is going under. If you are laid off and the company stays healthy, it makes sense to have some concessions. But if the entire business ceases to exist. I don't know why would you expect anything from it.

Re: Trucking startup Convoy closes operations with no buyer

#160

Post by adam_arthur »

ska wrote: post #141
hipadev23 wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> I'd argue the business failing is a strong counterpoint to that assertion. That statement is pretty naive. There are plenty of things that can kill a startup without them having done anything specifically wrong at any level, let alone at the level of technical team.

While true, most of these startups that have already found product/market fit and go bust are operating off of unrealistically rosy projections.

Did this company need to burn their entire round in a single year? Probably not. Could they have established themselves with lower operating expenses and still grown over time? Probably.

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