Singapore headquartered freight rate management SaaS ( software-as-a-service) platform Freightify on Thursday said it raised $12 million in an early stage of funding led by Sequoia Capital India. TMV and Alteria Capital as well as returning investors Blume Ventures, Nordic Eye Venture Capital and Motion Ventures, participated in the funding round which is a mix of equity and debt, the company said in a statement.Freightify makes software that serves freight operators with their requirements of white labelled customer portals, tracking and tracing of shipments in real-time and integration with existing transportation management systems.The company had previously raised $2.5 million in funding, bringing the total capital raised by the startup to $14.5 million.The fresh funds will be used to strengthen product offerings and add new functionalities, expand the sales presence globally, build channel partnerships, strengthen marketing to drive growth and expand into new geographies and segments, the company statement added. It plans to hire across geographies, especially Chennai.Global freight forwarding, the statement said, is a $300 billion industry that facilitates the movement of cargo from one place to another through a series of manual and legacy processes.Freightify claimed that its SaaS platform allows freight forwarders to procure, manage and quote freight prices, including all possible ancillary charges in less than 2 minutes.Discover the stories of your interestBlockchain5 StoriesCyber-safety7 StoriesFintech9 StoriesE-comm9 StoriesML8 StoriesEdtech6 Stories“The freight forwarding industry is a cornerstone of the global trade economy and despite the massive size, much of the industry remains constrained by manual processes and runs on paper, excel sheets and phone calls,” Mayank Porwal, vice president, Sequoia Capital India, added.The platform allows any forwarder to create a digital storefront to serve their customers and also includes track and trace solutions that help freight forwarders in getting live locations of vessels and automated milestones within seconds.Over 200 freight forwarding companies providing global logistics services across 45 countries use 2016-founded Freightify to digitise their business.Founder Raghavendran Viswanathan holds experience in working in logistics, supply chain and freight management with companies including DHL and Panalpina. Headquartered in Singapore with a technology and product development team in Chennai, Freightify initially started as a marketplace for freight forwarders to search, book and track freight, before its SaaS pivot.Currently, it claims to be expanding rapidly across Europe, Australia and key regions in Asia Pacific, and North America.