Opply eats up $4 million to disrupt supply chain experience for food and drink SMEs

In the midst of ongoing supply chain issues in the post-Brexit and post-covid world, London-based automated B2B supply chain platform Opply has raised $4 million in funding to disrupt the outdated supply chain experience for food and drink SMEs through AI. Leading the round were investors such as Chalfen Ventures and Anthemis Group. The startup will use the new cash to expand its engineering and commercial teams that will deliver the global go-to-market strategy.

Globally, SME consumer goods brands spend an estimated $1.4 trillion annually on the cost of goods. Yet, the market suffers from a lack of transparency and relationships in the supply chain.

Founded in 2021, Opply’s marketplace connects small to medium-sized food and beverage consumer brands with suppliers. It aims to disrupt how SME food and beverage brands find, communicate and order from suppliers. The personalised end-to-end supply platform covers everything from sourcing to simplified workflows to payment systems.

According to the startup, it saves customers an average of two months – the time it would take to source ingredients, along with a saving of at 20% on costs by automating the supply chain.

Talking about how the platform is automating purchasing end-to-end, Helen Murphy, CEO and co-founder of Opply said: “The platform takes what was a highly fragmented market and a frustrating, time-consuming process for both parties and brings it firmly into the modern global retail environment. Starting with food and beverage brands, we have built a supplier database alongside an automated sourcing and ordering process.”

Mike Chalfen, founder at Chalfen Ventures, added, “I like to invest in companies that capture new data, make intelligent automation easily actionable, and so create large new markets. With Opply, brands can source transactable supplier data while managing procurement from sourcing and order management to transaction and financing.”