Tech start up 5U AI raises US$3.2 million

5U AI has raised US$3.2 million in pre-seed funding to expand its AI-powered digital workforce platform, which helps freight forwarders automate operational tasks across air, sea and road freight while capturing the reasoning behind each decision. The funding, led by London-based Emerge Capital, will support product development and European expansion. The platform integrates with existing freight systems, using AI Workers to manage quoting, bookings, tracking, invoicing and other complex logistics workflows. Already deployed with freight forwarders and carriers across Europe, including TCI International Logistics, 5U AI plans to grow its team as it scales. The company aims to help logistics providers reduce manual administration, improve decision-making and increase operational capacity without replacing existing systems. 5U AI, the freight Agentic AI specialist building a digital workforce platform for European freight forwarding teams, has raised US$3.2 million in pre-seed funding to scale up its software offering. The platform uses AI Workers to manage operational tasks across air, sea, and road freight, including quoting, bookings, shipment tracking, invoice reconciliation, data entry, and routine administration. The AI Workers capture the reasoning behind each freight decision as they work, helping teams build knowledge that can improve future processes, rather than simply automating isolated tasks. “Freight forwarding is full of decisions that are still trapped in inboxes, spreadsheets, and people’s heads,” said Yagiz Abik, Chief Executive Officer, 5U AI. “We are not building another chatbot that answers questions and disappears, we are building AI Workers that understand freight operations, carry out the work, and capture the reasoning behind every decision, so teams can scale their knowledge as well as their capacity.” The pre-seed round was led by London-based Emerge Capital and will support product development and 5U AI’s European go-to-market programme. 5U AI works inside existing freight systems and uses multi-agent AI trained for logistics workflows, including the complex exceptions and manual decisions that make forwarding operations difficult to automate with generic AI tools or legacy automation. Its Decision Layer records how each AI Worker reaches a decision, giving operations teams visibility over what has been done, why it has been done, and how similar decisions can be improved over time. The company is already live with forwarders and carriers across Europe, including with TCI International Logistics, where its AI Workers are being used across air and ocean freight operations. 5U AI is growing its team as part of the scale-up, with plans to hire across product, engineering, operations, commercial, and customer functions. “AI is one of the most exciting developments logistics has seen for a generation, but its value will depend on people who understand the industry and want to build practical tools that solve real operational problems,” said Abik. “We are actively looking for people who want to join us at this early stage and help shape the next chapter of freight forwarding.” Founded in 2025 by Technical University of Munich graduates, Yagiz Abik and Fehmi Şener, 5U AI is backed by senior logistics executives, including former leaders from DHL, GEODIS, DSV, Maersk, and Ceva Logistics. 5U AI solutions support freight forwarders, carriers, and 3PLs that want to reduce manual administration, improve operational decision making, and scale customer service without replacing their existing systems.