Page 118 - Innovation Delaware 2018

SOFTWARE/DIGITAL ENTERPRISE
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Delivery Circle
Enterprise Center in 2014, the delivery services company had five drivers and operated in 20 ZIP codes. Today, it covers
15 states and more than 6,000 ZIP codes, with 950 drivers operating minivans, vans, box trucks and cargo vans.
STILL GOING STRONG
There may be examples of more rapid growth among Delaware businesses than what Delivery Circle has experienced over the past few years, but there probably aren’t many.
“Our platform doesn’t just provide a driver and a vehicle,” Rao says. “We help with delivery optimization and analytics on performance. It’s all designed to make better decisions for customers.”
And that’s going to help Delivery Circle keep on growing. ID
When it launched in the New Castle County Emerging
VIJAYA RAO
“Over the next two years, we want to be in 30 states,” says CEO and Founder VIJAYA RAO. “We want to be fully functional there and saturate the market.”
Delivery Circle provides outsourced delivery services for a variety of clients, from Fortune 500 firms to regional concerns and mom-and-pop shops. What those clients all have in common is a desire to keep their books clear of the assets necessary to handle deliveries themselves, such as vehicles and personnel.
Delivery Circle works with its customers to provide service that allows for quick turnarounds, as well as scheduled work that can come weekly or monthly.
“What you get with us is the ability for a company to focus on its business and growth,” Rao says. “With our pay-as-you-go model, a company can expand quickly and still stay with us.”
Rao reports that several of Delivery Circle’s clients have expanded during their relationship, and that has helped the company move from Delaware throughout the Mid-Atlantic states, the Northeast and as far south as Georgia.
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TRENDS AND KEY FACTS
1. Broadband access is expanding throughout Delaware, thanks to public-private partnerships initiated by the state. Since 2010, Delaware’s Broadband Mapping Project has awarded $3.1 million in federal grants for Delaware’s Broadband Initiative. The goal is to work toward greater saturation of the First State, with an emphasis on more sparsely populated areas that aren’t as attractive to providers. Still, Delaware residents had 98 percent coverage in 2017,
and only 9 percent of residents were underserved. By offering incentives, the Department of Technology and Information is working to improve on Delaware’s number-three ranking
among states in internet access and speed. The top five fastest cities for broadband in the state are Millsboro, Seaford, Bear, Middletown and Milton. Source: James Collins, Chief Information Officer, State of Delaware; Broadband Now
2. No matter how fast broadband connections may be and how easily people can get their data from the cloud, that information must be warehoused and condensed so that it is more manageable and able to be stored more effectively. Companies such as Delaware’s Extreme Scale Solutions are developing protocols and products that allow for databases to be combined into fewer servers, the better to allow for streamlined operations.
3. Since it began in 2013, Delaware’s Broadband Grant Fund has helped companies expand service throughout the state. For instance, from 2015–16, 350 miles of fiber optics were added. Source: Government Technology Magazine
4. Companies such as Trinity Logistics are creating digital enterprise applications that will allow businesses to provide faster, more responsive service to their customers. By developing more sophisticated processes, businesses are able to anticipate needs and react to requests more quickly and efficiently, providing solutions that are more accurate and precise. ID
116 DelawareBusinessTimes.com
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