From shipments to software: Delhivery eyes new growth via Transport One

From shipments to software: Delhivery eyes new growth via Transport One

After years of moving parcels across India’s chaotic logistics network, Delhivery is looking to monetise something less tangible but arguably more powerful: its logistics intelligence.

The company’s latest bet is Transport One, a standalone SaaS (software as a service) product launched earlier this year, designed to help manufacturers streamline freight planning, procurement, and billing using AI (artificial intelligence).

"Transport One is an AI-native product built on our experience of delivering a billion-plus shipments across 18,000 pin codes," Surajit Das, Head of Software Solutions at Delhivery, told Moneycontrol.

Unlike traditional workflow-based transport management systems (TMS), Transport One draws on Delhivery’s massive operational data to optimise mid- and last-mile freight movement, detect exceptions in real time, and feed insights back into planning.

It is squarely aimed at manufacturers with annual revenues around Rs 5,000 crore — firms that have grown fast but still manage logistics manually or through piecemeal software.

“Most existing products are just workflow tools. Transport One is a positive RoI (return on investment) , AI-native product with embedded operational intelligence at scale. No other player today has access to operational data at Delhivery’s scale,” Das said.

How does it work

Transport One plugs into a customer’s warehouse or ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) system and manages the entire transport chain — from smart route planning and automated indenting of transporters to control tower-based shipment tracking and digital freight audits.

Though not built on large language models (LLMs), it uses Delhivery’s proprietary AI algorithms to optimise planning based on historical shipment and capacity data.

While the system doesn’t directly speed up deliveries, it enables exception detection and process efficiency that can indirectly improve turnaround time. In terms of savings, Delhivery estimates an RoI between 5 percent and 12 percent, depending on the modules a customer use — with freight audit, route optimisation, and procurement automation, each contributing to meaningful cost reductions.

Transport One also marks a strategic milestone for the company, as it builds out a broader suite of SaaS offerings that includes OS One (for operational visibility), LocateOne (for location intelligence), and DispatchOne (for tracking deliveries — including those for NGO partners like the Akshaya Patra Foundation). But Delhivery is positioning Transport One as the upstream anchor product in its stack — where freight decisions begin.

“This is our first year in the market. Internally, the product has been proven at scale,” said Das. The company has also launched an Emerging Enterprise Programme to seed adoption among smaller firms, offering Rs 9 lakh in free credits to 10 manufacturing companies with revenues below Rs 2,000 crore. The programme, Das said, is already oversubscribed.

Notably, the product is not being offered to third-party logistics firms or even competitors — at least not yet. Delhivery’s focus is firmly on manufacturers and enterprise clients.

Asked whether the SaaS push is part of a larger strategic pivot, Das declined to comment directly, but noted: “Upstream SaaS solutions are critical for driving logistics efficiency in India, where logistics spend is about 500 basis points higher than in developed economies.” In other words, for a country that still spends disproportionately on moving goods, there’s a growing appetite for software that can tighten the screws.

Financials

Transport One comes at a time when Delhivery is on a stronger financial footing. In Q4 FY25, the company reported a net profit of Rs 72.6 crore — a sharp swing from the Rs 68.5 crore loss it posted in the same quarter last year.

Sequentially, profit jumped nearly 190 percent from Rs 25 crore in Q3FY25. Revenue from operations stood at Rs 2,192 crore, up nearly 6 percent year on year, though down 7.8 percent sequentially.

EBITDA (Earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation) more than doubled to Rs 119 crore, and margins rose to 5.4 percent in the March quarter. For the full financial year, Delhivery posted a net profit of Rs 162 crore, marking its first-ever profitable year after a loss of Rs 249 crore in FY24.

That shift gives Delhivery the runway to invest in new products like Transport One — not just as an internal tool, but as revenue-generating platforms for India Inc.

As logistics firms across the globe look to productise their operational expertise, Delhivery’s bet on Transport One reflects a larger trend: the monetisation of logistics know-how via software. But while the platform is off to a promising start, sustained adoption will depend on how willing traditional manufacturers are to overhaul legacy transport operations — and how well Delhivery can support that transformation.