Freightos is bringing its online freight marketplace to the UK to provide comparison, booking and management services for importers and exporters.

The online international shipping marketplace says freight technology is stuck in the 1970s with inaccessible information, lack of transparency and offline communications resulting in companies wasting days on freight quoting and overpaying on shipping by as much as 40 per cent.

Freightos uses pricing/routing algorithms, the world’s largest freight rate database and dozens of sellers, and the Freightos Marketplace has brought better and more affordable freight to thousands of businesses.

Freightos founder and chief executive officer, Zvi Schreiber says: “Our team’s been pursuing frictionless global trade for years and we’ve now reached the tipping point.  By expanding to the UK, we’re making global freight easier for UK retailers, importers, manufacturers, and exporters.”

“Pax Britannica paved the way for unprecedented global trade in the 19th century, triggering the gradual build-up to over $19 trillion dollars worth of goods imported and exported annually. Global trade has reached record heights. It’s now time to turn towards technology to help propel it even further.”

Freightos says the UK was the ninth-largest exporter and fourth-largest importer worldwide in 2015 with a combined annual global trade of £797 billion.

It says the UK market is essential to European trade, the US is the largest export market worth £42.4 billion, Germany at £30.6 billion, Switzerland at £25.2 billion, China at £21.4 billion and the Netherlands worth £18.5 billion.

The top import origins are Germany (£72.7 billion), China (£48.6 billion), the US (£34.7 billion), the Netherlands (£34.4 billion) and France (£29.1 billion).