Urban logistics firm PORT has closed a €14.5 million funding round to accelerate its shift toward autonomous delivery systems. The investment, led by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and Balnord alongside existing and new backers, combines equity and debt components. This brings PORT's total capital raised to €29 million since its 2020 founding, adding to the €14.5 million secured through earlier pre-seed and seed stages.
Under the leadership of CEO Kamil Suda, PORT has built a foundation in urban logistics centred on a network of microhubs and e-bike subscriptions. The platform currently serves more than 50,000 couriers and operates roughly 3,500 electric bicycles. Across London, Manchester and Birmingham, PORT maintains 24 microhubs spanning approximately 52,000 square feet of urban real estate—including underground car parks, warehouses and railway arches—where delivery vehicles are stored, charged and dispatched to high-demand zones.
The company's next phase centres on developing proprietary autonomous systems built atop this existing infrastructure. PORT is constructing an AI Driver and autonomous delivery vehicles designed to handle last-mile logistics without human operators. The foundation for this technology comes from data gathered across its operational e-bike fleet, which is being used to train machine learning models tailored to urban delivery environments.
To capture real-world conditions, some of PORT's e-bikes are fitted with NVIDIA-powered cameras and lidar sensors that record delivery scenarios on London streets. This dataset encompasses routine situations—navigating kerbs, passing cyclists, locating drop-off points—as well as edge cases. Once bikes return to PORT's hubs, the recorded data is automatically transferred and processed to refine the AI Driver system that will eventually control autonomous delivery vehicles.
We believe robotised logistics does not start with the robot; it starts with the infrastructure, operations and data required to put robotics to work in the real world. We have spent years building that foundation. Now, with this investment, we are focused on the physical AI and robotics that will run on top of it,
Kamil Suda, founder and CEO of PORT
Beyond autonomous vehicles, PORT has expanded its service offerings to include cargo-bike parcel delivery, positioning itself as a lower-carbon alternative to conventional diesel-based logistics networks.
PORT is advancing its autonomous capabilities through a partnership with Royal Mail, which will introduce a new robotic delivery system. This collaboration leverages PORT's existing microhub infrastructure and ongoing autonomous vehicle development efforts.
The fresh capital will fund further development of PORT's AI Driver and autonomous delivery vehicles, as well as expansion of its broader autonomous logistics platform. The company intends to accelerate recruitment across research and development and artificial intelligence divisions.
Source: Tech.eu
