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Flexport, Inc.

Digital Freight Forwarding and Supply Chain TechnologyFounded 2013
Reviewed by Swet Parvadiya
Company data updated: October 2026

Founders

Who Founded Flexport?

Ryan Petersen, David Habben · Founded 2013 · HQ today: San Francisco, California

Who founded Flexport?

Flexport was founded by Ryan Petersen, David Habben in 2013. It is now led by Ryan Petersen.

Founders
Ryan Petersen, David Habben
Founded
2013
Headquarters
San Francisco, California
Number of founders
2
Current CEO
Ryan Petersen (since 2013)
Where was Flexport founded?
Flexport was founded in San Francisco, California in 2013.
When was Flexport founded?
Flexport was founded in 2013.
Who started Flexport?
Flexport was founded by Ryan Petersen and David Habben.
How old is Flexport?
Flexport is 13 years old as of 2026.

Founding Story

Before Flexport, Ryan Petersen co-founded ImportGenius, a data business built on U.S. customs manifest records, and had imported goods from China himself. The manual, email-and-fax nature of freight forwarding convinced him the industry needed an operating system. He founded Flexport in 2013, went through Y Combinator's Winter 2014 batch, and obtained the licenses to act as a forwarder and customs broker rather than only selling software.

Ryan Petersen

Co-founder 2013

Background

Co-founder of ImportGenius, a U.S. customs-data business, and a former importer of goods from China; UC Berkeley economics graduate.

Role at Flexport, Inc.

Ryan Petersen founded Flexport in 2013 after running import businesses and co-founding ImportGenius, which compiled U.S. customs manifest data. Frustrated by fax-and-email freight forwarding, he took Flexport through Y Combinator in 2014 and built it into a licensed forwarder and customs broker backed by Founders Fund, Andreessen Horowitz, SoftBank and Shopify. He handed the CEO role to Dave Clark in 2022, returned in September 2023, and has since led the company's cost reset, the 2025 Convoy Platform sale and its 2026 push into tariff-refund and customs services. Ryan Petersen was born in 1981.

David Habben

Co-founder 2013

Background

Software engineer and early tech employee.

Role at Flexport, Inc.

David Habben co-founded Flexport in 2013 alongside Ryan Petersen. While Petersen handled the massive regulatory and business complexities of global shipping, Habben served as the technical architect. He built the initial, highly disruptive software dashboard that allowed companies to actually track their ocean freight in real-time—a feature that the massive, archaic freight forwarding industry completely lacked at the time. (Exact birth year remains publicly undisclosed).

Flexport, Inc.: CEO & Leadership History

Full timeline →

Dave Clark

Former Chief Executive Officer

2022 – 2023

Clark stepped down in September 2023 amid disagreement over spending and direction as freight demand weakened.

Ryan Petersen

Founder and Chief Executive Officer

2013 – Present

Built Flexport into one of the best-funded logistics startups and a public voice on supply chains during the 2021 port crisis; now leading the company toward organic profitability before any IPO.

Keep researching Flexport

Who Founded Flexport? FAQ

Who founded Flexport and what original frustration inspired its creation in 2013?

Flexport was founded in 2013 by Ryan Petersen in San Francisco, California. After spending years running an e-commerce import business and building customs data company ImportGenius, Petersen was frustrated by the opaque, paper-heavy, and error-prone processes of traditional freight forwarders.

How did Y Combinator help launch Flexport in early 2014?

In early 2014, Flexport was accepted into the prestigious Y Combinator startup accelerator (Winter 2014 batch). During YC, Ryan Petersen secured official Federal Maritime Commission (FMC) ocean freight forwarder licensing and pitched his digital freight vision, raising seed funding from top tech investors.

Who was Susheel Kirpalani and what role did early engineering leaders play at Flexport?

Early engineering and product leaders collaborated with Ryan Petersen to build Flexport's core digital customs compliance engine, online rate-quoting algorithms, and real-time container tracking databases from scratch in Ruby on Rails and React.

What early venture capital firms backed Ryan Petersen's vision of digital global trade?

Early venture backing came from Peter Thiel's Founders Fund, First Round Capital, Bloomberg Beta, Google Ventures, and prominent angel investors including Paul Graham and Alexis Ohanian, who recognized the large multi-trillion-dollar market ripe for digital disruption.

How did founder Ryan Petersen obtain licensed customs brokerage credentials for Flexport?

Unlike software-only aggregator platforms, Ryan Petersen insisted that Flexport become a fully licensed, regulated U.S. Customs Broker and Ocean Transportation Intermediary (OTI), hiring veteran maritime logistics operators to ensure legal compliance and cargo authority.

What was the founding ethos that Ryan Petersen established for Flexport?

Ryan Petersen established the core mission 'To make global trade easy for everyone.' He believed that removing friction, opacity, and bureaucracy from international trade would lower consumer prices, empower global entrepreneurs, and foster peaceful global commerce.

What previous entrepreneurial ventures did Ryan Petersen create before Flexport?

Before Flexport, Ryan Petersen co-founded ImportGenius with his brother David Petersen, building a successful business intelligence platform that indexed and analyzed public maritime shipping manifest data from customs agencies worldwide.

How has the founder's vision transformed the century-old freight forwarding industry?

Ryan Petersen forced the entire global shipping and logistics industry into the 21st century, establishing the standard for digital freight transparency, automated tracking, and cloud collaboration across global supply chains.

Who founded Flexport?

It was founded by Ryan Petersen. A highly charismatic figure, he famously used Twitter during the massive 2021 supply chain crisis to literally rent a boat, drive around the congested Port of Long Beach, and publicly shame the port authorities for their massive inefficiencies, making Flexport globally famous.

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Content is for informational purposes only. Not financial advice. Data sourced from SEC filings, annual reports, and public records. See our full disclaimer and methodology.