Brazilian Trade Platform ZAX Raises $6M in Series A

Brazilian business-to-business (B2B) trade platform ZAX raised $6 million in a Series A funding round led by Atlantico, with participation from FJ Labs, Caravela Capital, GFC and Canary, bringing the startup’s total capital raised to $8.3 million, TechCrunch reported.

With an eye on developing a platform to bring together freight, delivery and payments while connecting buyers with sellers, ZAX originally launched as a clothing wholesale platform before expanding to include shoes, electronics, toys, accessories and beauty items.

Launched in São Paulo in 2019 by Bruno Ballardie, who serves as CEO, and Fernando Zanatta, chief technology officer (CTO), the company is striving to move beyond Brazil’s R$2.4 trillion ($445.6 billion) market and expand across Latin America.

See also: Visa’s Cybersource On Brazil’s Digital Leap

“We saw a huge opportunity to help people make a great business,” Ballardie said. “The market was lagging — there is only 7% of eCommerce penetration, and in the wholesale sector, it is 1% or lower. All of the area was underdeveloped in terms of logistics, payments and products discovery, so we created a tool for that.”

The startup is currently working with more than 700 suppliers. Since March 2020, the company saw its revenue surge 10 times as over 50,000 buyers took to the platform. ZAX has a workforce of 65 people.

The fresh infusion of capital will be used to grow across two additional regions in Brazil and hire more talent in the technology and product development areas. ZAX is also eyeing opportunities in financial services and trialing buy now, pay later initiatives while it seeks financial partners to offer working capital to its customers.

Currently, ZAX extends a 30-day line of capital and point-of-sale (POS) system with follow-up plans for a digital wallet and other payment tools.