Roadrunner Freight bolsters LTL capabilities with $50 million in new backing

Roadrunner Freight, the national less than truckload (LTL) carrier that was created in a 2020 spinoff from troubled parent company Roadrunner Transportation Systems Inc., has raised $50 million in funding for “technology investments and continued transformation,” the company said today.

The “equity private placement” round was led by Andrew Leto, founder of GlobalTranz and Emerge, who invested $10 million and was joined by other participants including affiliates of Elliott Investment Management, Fox Hill Capital, Memento S.A., Solas Capital, existing management, and former OmniTrax Inc. CEO Kevin Shuba.

Following the round, Leto and Shuba will join Roadrunner’s board.

The move combines Roadrunner’s traditional position as an asset-based carrier with the logistics technology expertise offered by its new investors. Of the companies led by its new board members, GlobalTranz is a data-driven truckload and LTL broker, Emerge is a cloud-based shipping platform and marketplace targeting overflow truckload capacity, and OmniTrax is a private railroad holding company. Leto also founded 10-4 Systems, a truckload and visibility platform which was acquired by Trimble in 2017.

“Roadrunner is really a technology moving trucks, not a trucking company. Every shipper needs a consolidator like Roadrunner, and most are not taking advantage of what Roadrunner has to offer,” Leto said in a release. “We are changing that. This team has done a great job cleaning up a mess and getting Roadrunner back to its roots in LTL. I look forward to helping drive this transformation, especially through our technology development.”

Downers Grove, Illinois-based Roadrunner Freight was created when Roadrunner Transportation Systems Inc. spun off its global logistics arm as Ascent Global Logistics following a 2018 accounting scandal.