Freightos has launched its online marketplace for international freight.

The platform enables users to compare, book and manage freight services from providers in real time.

“The logistics industry is the backbone of global trade,” said Zvi Schreiber, CEO and founder of Freightos. “At US$4 trillion, it accounts for about 10% of the world’s GDP. But this foundation of the international economy is slow, opaque, and offline. Over the last four years, Freightos has brought some of the world’s largest logistics providers around online. Today we are thrilled to launch the world’s first online marketplace, which will make shipping goods as easy as booking a flight online. The future of global trade starts today.”

According to Freightos, the new marketplace will deliver ease and transparency to the trillion-dollar freight market because it solves issues such as siloed information, lack of pricing transparency, quote delays and obsolete analogue documentation.

​“Booking a flight has been electronic for 50 years, but the cargo on airplanes, trucks, and ships is still booked manually,” said Robert Mylod, investor and director of Freightos, and former CFO of online​ ​travel marketplace Priceline Group. “This cannot continue. Growing global trade, e-commerce B2B sales and sprawling dynamic supply chains​ ​demand the transparency and efficiency of online freight. Just like passenger travel went online to accommodate the demands of a growing market, Freightos is finally ushering in a much-needed digital marketplace for freight.”

Prior to the launch, Freightos automated more than 5 million freight price quotes for forwarders such as Nippon Express, Hellmann Worldwide Logistics and CEVA. The same technology is used to power the new product.

The marketplace, which will initially focus on Chinese air and ocean exports to the US, launched in closed beta in January 2016, according to Freightos.