Including Legion, Ecomtent, and Cerve: 12 retail technology funding rounds you need to know about

RTIH rounds up 12 retail systems ventures who have recently secured significant investments in their businesses, including rediem, Movopack, Mantis Robotics, Justt, HappyRobot, Pixevia, and Reconome.

1. Movopack

Movopack, a company providing e-commerce platforms with circular and sustainable packaging, has raised a £2 million seed funding round led by early-stage investor 360 Capital, with participation from Greiner Innoventures and Techstars.

The cash will go towards the firm’s official launch in the UK - its first expansion outside of Italy.

The aim is to allow consumers to easily return packaging through the Royal Mail postal system, providing access to any of its 115,000 postboxes across the country.

The Milan headquartered company was co-founded by high school friends Tomaso Torriani (CEO), Alberto Cisco (CCO), and Andrea Cipollone (COO), who recognised the environmental oversight of single-use e-commerce packaging and the lack of affordable and practical sustainable alternatives.

Movopack’s packaging, made from recycled plastic bottles (rPET) and woven recycled polypropylene (PP), is designed to endure postal handling and can be reused by retailers up to 20 times.

2. rediem

rediem, a loyalty software specialist, has announced a $1.2 million pre-seed round.

Led by Ivy Ventures, with participation from Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator; Netcore CEO; Jebbit founders, and e-commerce investors, the capital supports onboarding a 500 company waitlist to rediem’s AI powered Software-as-a-Service customer engagement platform.

"I believe in the vision for transforming legacy, outdated rewards programmes,” says Scott Kraege, Partner at Ivy Ventures. "The early momentum is incredibly promising, and the strong adoption by enterprises further validates rediem’s thesis on the future of brand-customer relationships.”

“rediem meets a moment in which purpose driven brands are eager to demonstrate their core beliefs to customers versus merely communicating them,” says Sarah Ganzenmuller, Co-founder and CEO at remarked. “We’re inspired by the positive impact brands make when customers are mobilised beyond purchase.”

Led by two under 30 founders - Harvard graduate Regan Plekenpol and former consultant Sarah Ganzenmuller - rediem is currently invite only to allow for an onboarding process of no more than five customers per month.

3. HappyRobot

HappyRobot reports a $15.6 million Series A round, led by Andreessen Horowitz, with support from Y Combinator and other strategic investors, to automate communication across the supply chain with AI.

In a LinkedIn post, the company said: “We enable freight brokers, 3PLs, carriers and warehouses with AI workers that handle tasks like carrier negotiations, track and trace, payment status updates, and more. With HappyRobot, every call is answered and every load checked.”

“Our customers see phone calls handled in half the time, with operational costs reduced by one-third. Brokers are freed to focus on higher value strategy and relationship building, while customers and carriers get information 24/7 with no hold time.”

“Since we went live with our first customer in April, we’ve automated more than one million phone calls for some of the largest players in freight. But this is just the start for us. We began with phone calls, but HappyRobot drives conversations across email, text, or any other channel, helping our customers deploy teams of AI workers where they need them the most.”

4. Cerve

London-based startup Cerve has closed a £3.5 million seed funding round led by SuperSeed, with participation from Zenith, Ponderosa and The First Thirty.

Cerve’s mission is to accelerate the digitisation of the global food supply chain via its API tools, delivering a standardised protocol. Over 2,000 organisations across the UK and Europe are utilising its infrastructure, including retailers, wholesalers, manufacturers, and producers.

Cerve was founded by Dan Mazig, a serial entrepreneur with expertise in leading data infrastructure and B2B solutions for Fortune 500 companies and early stage startups. Joining him is David Walker, Chief Commercial Officer, who brings senior leadership experience from Barclays, Dyson and Sky.

5. OneRail

OneRail, a provider of solutions in last mile omnichannel fulfilment, has bagged new investment led by Los Angeles-based Aliment Capital.

“This new financing enables us to deepen our decision logic upstream, in the inventory and order routing process, while continuing to expand our last mile fulfilment market penetration,” says OneRail Founder and CEO Bill Catania, referring to the company’s June acquisition of Orderbot, an inventory and distributed order management solution.

“The Orderbot acquisition helps solve some of the acute challenges facing retailers and wholesalers, including split orders, out-of-stocks and canceled orders, through order routing logic that enables the dynamic selection of inventory from an array of fulfilment locations within a localised geography (based on order, shipping status and delivery cost) in real-time.”

“We’re strengthening our commitment to data science, machine learning and AI, enhancing our ability to offer the most robust multimodal, multi-carrier solution in the industry and derive deeper, more actionable insights from the extensive data that our platform generates, leading to lower fulfilment costs.”

6. TRUSS

FIGR Ventures, a newly established family office fund, has announced its first portfolio investment into TRUSS, a UK-based tech startup powering fashion resale with AI enabled data infrastructure.

TRUSS was founded by Warwick University graduates Woody Lello (CEO), Felix Jackson (COO), Jack Cardwell (CIO) and Connor Mattinson (CTO).

Officially launched in 2022, it creates millions of product profiles which contain detailed information about any product. Using only a photo, businesses can tap into this information to list products efficiently, enhance searchability and improve conversion rates.

With the new £300,000 investment from FIGR, TRUSS has secured critical match funding to activate a £1.1 million Innovate UK grant. This funding supports a collaborative project with the University of Warwick, Depop and Selfridges to develop a bespoke algorithm that can instantly recognise a fashion item from TRUSS’ database using a single image.

The investment will be used to enhance its tech capabilities, expand and enrich the product catalogue, grow the team and develop further partnerships with businesses that can benefit from TRUSS’ product.   

The startup has previously raised £345,000 in a pre-seed round led by SFC Capital, alongside angel investors, and says that it is now supporting major fashion retailers with its technology.

7. Legion Technologies

Legion Technologies, a specialist in workforce management, has received $50 million in financing from Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), a division of First Citizens Bank. The raise, which brings Legion’s total funding to $195 million, follows a $50 million growth round led by Riverwood Capital earlier this year.

“From the beginning, we have been on a mission to improve hourly jobs and the capital we’ve received from investors this year demonstrates the enduring value of that mission,” says Sanish Mondkar, Founder and CEO at Legion Technologies.

“Our tremendous growth stems from the accelerating need for effective workforce management solutions, and this latest financing from SVB further proves that our intelligently automated, employee centric platform is the best choice for today’s hourly employees.”

“There is increased demand for AI native workforce management solutions that can improve both labour operations and the employee experience,” says Marisa Phan, Managing Director at Silicon Valley Bank.

“Legion has successfully been working to transform the hourly work experience to meet the needs of the modern employee. With this latest financing, we are proud to support Legion as it enables intelligent automation to shape a new future of work.”

8. Mantis Robotics

Mantis Robotics reports $5 million in new investments led by Emerald Technology Ventures with participation from the Amazon Industrial Innovation Fund. This will enable it to scale its operations, enhance its product portfolio, and expand its presence in the industrial robotics market.

“We built our company on the premise that robots should be an extension of the human capability,” says Gerry Vannuffelen, Founder and CEO at Mantis Robotics. “Our industry has benefited greatly from many new developments in AI powered application software Unfortunately, these systems do not allow for safe human-robot interaction. We provide the link between AI and the physical world, by enabling robots to interact safely and capably with humans.”

“The investment into Mantis Robotics is another bet of Emerald on the huge potential of physical AI. We believe its unique technology will revolutionise robotics and will enable never seen before levels of human-machine collaboration. Mantis Robotics unlocks entirely new automation use cases initially in manufacturing and in warehousing, and in soon virtually every other domain,” says Michal Natora, Senior Investment Director at Emerald.

9. Ecomtent

Ecomtent, a generative AI startup focused on helping sellers and retailers with AI powered search, has landed $1.4 million in funding.

The round was led by MaRS IAF, and included Twinpath, Techstars x eBay Ventures, and C-suite angels from retailers and the tech industry.

Founded in 2022 by Max Sinclair, a former Amazon executive who led key initiatives such as the launch of Amazon in Singapore and Amazon Grocery across the EU, and Timur Luguev, a PhD and Postdoctoral Researcher in machine learning, Ecomtent's platform generates visual and written content optimised for AI powered search, such as Amazon’s RUFUS.

"The way people shop online is undergoing a profound transformation," says Sinclair. "And therefore also how sellers and retailers optimise for discoverability and conversion is changing. Longtail keyword matching is dead. The future lies in aligning with customer intent, across both written and visual assets."

10. Reconome

Reconome, which repurposes surplus technology with a focus on underserved communities, has received a £3.3 million investment from IW Capital.

In a LinkedIn post, Lou Nylander, Head of Marketing at Reconome, said: "As a B Corp dedicated to creating positive change, this investment will supercharge our mission to revolutionise how we think about technology's lifecycle. We're not just managing surplus electronic devices - we're building a future where digital equity and sustainability go hand in hand."

"What gets me particularly excited about this milestone: we're extending the life of electronic equipment, preventing valuable tech from reaching landfills; our profits directly support digital inclusion, providing refurbished devices to schools and charities; we're proving that purpose and profit can coexist beautifully in the tech space."

She added: "Huge thanks to our incredible CEO Nick Hajime Rawkins and IW Capital Investment Director Alex Valente Petri for their vision and dedication in making this happen. And, of course, Nisa Kuday, your marketing magic support has been invaluable, and I can't wait to work with you more. This is more than an investment - it's a vote of confidence in our belief that business can be a force for good. Watch this space - we're just getting started!"

11. Pixevia

Pixevia, a Vilnius, Lithuania-based startup that specialises in automated retail stores and analytics using AI and cameras, has raised €340,000 in a bridge round extension.

The funding was led by Coinvest Capital, contributing €170k, with the remainder from new and existing investors.

“This funding allows us to allocate more resources to specific countries and accelerate deployments, reaffirming our dedication to revolutionising retail with AI powered technologies,” says Mindaugas Eglinskas, Founder and CEO at Pixevia.

This builds on a €1.5 million funding round in May 2024. With the additional €340k, Pixevia is targeting roll-outs in Taiwan, Belgium, Italy, and Poland, while bolstering its operations in the APAC region, Europe, and the US.

12. Justt

Justt, a specialist in AI based chargeback management, has closed a $30 million Series C funding round, led by Zeev Ventures with participation from existing investors Oak HC/FT and F2 Venture Capital. Total funding now stands at $100 million.

"Justt's advanced AI and machine learning driven approach is revolutionising chargeback management, providing merchants with a scalable, results driven solution to navigate an increasingly complex payments landscape," says Oren Zeev, Founding Partner at Zeev Ventures.

"Its ability to execute, innovate, and deliver measurable value to merchants worldwide is unmatched. This funding underscores my confidence in its vision, leadership, and long-term strategy as it continues to expand globally and redefine the industry."