Leamington Spa's Ox Delivers catches eye of MIT

 OX Delivers, the Leamington Spa based e-mobility start-up which is aiming to revolutionise the transport of produce across the Global South, has been selected as a 2024 Solver team by the renowned MIT Solve. 

Solve was born out of the Office of the President of MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) in 2015, a natural offshoot of MIT’s mission to advance knowledge in science, technology, and other areas of scholarship that will best serve the nation and the world in the 21st century.

It launches open calls for exceptional and diverse solutions to the most pressing global challenges from anyone, anywhere in the world. Selected innovators get the backing of MIT and its community of supporters to scale their impact and drive lasting change.

OX Delivers was invited to New York City to pitch to an audience of more than 200 philanthropists, global leaders, and investors during Solve Challenge Finals, which is taking place at the beginning of the United Nations General Assembly and Climate Week.  

OX Delivers received $10,000 from MIT Solve and $25,000 funded by General Motors to scale impact and reach more lives. Additionally, they will begin a nine-month support programme through MIT Solve and receive access to additional funding opportunities, resources, experts, and mentorship. 

OX Delivers was selected by MIT Solve’s expert judges from a pool of more than 2,200 applicants from 130 countries. In this new class, 80 per cent of Solver teams are women-led and are headquartered in 13 countries.

Natalie Dowsett, Co-Founder of OX Delivers, said: "We are delighted to be recognised by such a prestigious organisation as MIT Solve and be selected from such a strong pool of international applicants. For OX Delivers, being a Solver team will give us unprecedented access to a range of experts and specialist support which will be vital as we scale up our operations to the next level.” 

“We look forward to sharing our mission to revolutionise how the Global South does business with a new audience via our MIT Solve programme."

OX Delivers is already providing reliable, affordable transport-as-a-service and transforming the lives of thousands of people in Rwanda. The company is dedicated to expanding the rollout of its transport-as-a-service offering across the Global South, starting on the African continent.

For less than $1, an OX Delivers customer can transport a sack of goods to market across poor quality roads, which are typical in the Global South. Efficiently and sustainably completing the task in a matter of hours instead of days by foot or bicycle, the OX Delivers transport-as-a-service model enables farmers and traders to access larger markets further from home, where prices are higher and new opportunities are available. This creates a self-reinforcing cycle of economic and social growth within local communities across the Global South.

With OX Delivers’ unique transport-as-a-service business model, customers pay only for the space they need on a kilogram-per-kilometre basis. The service is easily accessible via an app or toll-free number. Since its launch, OX has seen strong demand and is now supporting more than 4000 customers including smallholder farmers and traders, with 80 per cent of orders coming from repeat customers.  

The original OX Truck, designed by Professor Gordon Murray in 2016, was the world’s first flat-pack truck and the first vehicle designed specifically for Africa in forty years. The OX team has continuously advanced the truck design, evolving it into the first purpose-designed electric truck for the Global South. It is ten times cheaper to run than existing alternatives and will transform transport services across the continent. 

With the introduction of the next-generation truck, OX Delivers will continue scaling its impact across East Africa and beyond, targeting three billion people in developing countries without access to affordable, sustainable transport.