Engineering Manager

Augment makes first move into $8 trillion distribution sector. Augment has acquired Merlin, a stealth AI company focused on wholesale distribution. The move gives the supply chain AI platform its first foothold in the more than $8 trillion U.S. wholesale distribution sector. It's an industry that still relies heavily on legacy systems and spreadsheets. The deal brings distribution industry veteran Alex Moazed to Augment as president of wholesale distribution, along with co-founders Nick Johnson and John Schumacher, former head of AI at Grainger. One reason behind the acquisition? Customer demand. Freight brokers and carriers kept asking Augment CEO Harish Abbott whether the platform worked with distributors - their biggest customers. "When we looked at what Alex had built, two things stood out immediately: distribution-specific domain expertise that would have taken us years to replicate, and a data philosophy we share completely - customer data stays isolated, period," Abbott said. "It never trains models for anyone else." Moazed co-founded Merlin after running Applico Capital, the distribution industry's first dedicated venture capital fund, where he evaluated over 700 supply chain technology companies. Applico participated in Augment's seed round in January 2025. "By the time acquisition conversations got serious, the cultural and technological fit was already obvious," Moazed said. The case for A purpose-built distribution AI. B2B distribution is extremely decentralized, even more so than freight. Enterprise distributors lose margin to operational complexity driven by fragmented systems. This fragmentation creates inconsistent product language and manual processes across multiple enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems. "Sales reps spend 30 minutes entering a purchase order that a customer already typed out," Moazed said. "Counter reps get halfway through a quote, the ERP crashes, they start over. Branch managers call suppliers every two weeks just to check on open orders." A single enterprise might run six different ERPs. A quote can take two minutes per line across thousands of lines daily. Generic AI tools fail to handle unit conversions, customer-specific SKU language and exception-heavy workflows. Many also train shared models on proprietary distributor data without returning value to customers. "Distributor data is a competitive moat - their resistance to shared-data AI models isn't an objection to overcome, it's a legitimate business concern," Moazed said. Augment's platform, Augie, uses agentic AI to follow standard operating procedures written in natural language rather than custom code. "Previously, light business rules and workflow customization was put into the ERP with a small army of engineers writing custom code," Moazed said. "Now, the incremental cost of customizing workflow automation is headed towards zero because you are writing a process document in English and the AI agents are actioning the work alongside your human teammates." Acquisition augments existing customers. Augie's distribution offering is already operational with more than $20 billion in combined distributor revenue under management. Initial enterprise customers include Ewing Outdoor Supply, a $1 billion landscape distributor; Insco Distributing, a family-owned HVAC-R distributor; Brooks Safety Solutions, one of the nation's largest fire and safety distributors; and Reece, a $3.5 billion leader in plumbing and waterworks distribution. "Augie saves me 80% of the time spent on quoting," said Mike Mackey, Commercial Services Manager at Ewing Outdoor Supply. "It's as if I had my own personal assistant. It seamlessly integrates with workflows and automatically connects to my inbox and the ERP, with product search functionality that blows our ERP and website out of the water." Wholesale distributors operate some of the largest private fleets in the country. They are also among the biggest shippers of full truckload and less-than-truckload freight managed by the brokers and carriers Augment already serves. "The more of the supply chain Augie manages, the better it understands every transaction on it - where freight is coming from, why it's moving, and what happens on either end," Abbott said. "We're not building separate product infrastructure for separate industries. We're building one AI platform. The more of the supply chain it touches, the more valuable it gets for everyone on it."

Augment, an AI productivity platform for logistics, has launched Knowledge Hub, a freight-native knowledge system designed to capture and deliver operational expertise to logistics teams in real time. The platform unifies operational data, policies and institutional knowledge into a single layer accessible through transport management systems, portals, email and chat. Knowledge Hub addresses the challenge of scattered operational knowledge—such as carrier performance data and customer requirements—that often exists across multiple systems or resides with experienced staff. The system delivers context-aware answers during workflow execution, helping teams make consistent decisions on carrier selection, exception handling and risk management. The platform is available now to Augment customers, who can control knowledge sources, access permissions and deployment locations. Augment has raised $110 million from investors including Redpoint Ventures and 8VC.

Turvo and Augment partner to deliver ai-powered order-to-cash supply chain orchestration. News provided by. Integration brings advanced artificial intelligence to Turvo's Collaboration Cloud, accelerating efficiency, visibility, and profitability across global supply chains. DALLAS, Oct. 30, 2025 /PRNewswire/ - Turvo, LLC ("Turvo" or "the Company"), provider of the world's leading collaboration application designed specifically for the supply chain, today announced a strategic partnership with Augment, the AI productivity platform for logistics. Together, Turvo and Augment will deliver intelligent, end-to-end order-to-cash supply chain orchestration that combines Turvo's networked Collaboration Cloud with Augment's advanced AI capabilities. The partnership empowers shippers, freight brokers, and 3PLs to automate critical workflows, predict disruptions, and optimize execution in real-time - from order creation through final settlement. By embedding Augie, Augment's AI teammate for logistics, directly into Turvo's collaborative platform, customers can reduce manual work, shorten order-to-cash cycles, and unlock new levels of supply chain resilience and profitability. "Turvo's TMS is designed to bring order to the world's most complex supply chains," said Billy Sarracino, CEO of Turvo. "Through the combination of Augment's AI Teammate, Augie, and Turvo's TMS platform, we're providing our customers with an infinitely scalable virtual employee capable of automating workflows, accelerating orchestration, and driving outsized results with a combined technology solution never seen before in the industry." "Partnering with forward-thinking TMS platforms like Turvo helps us serve even more operators in their daily flow of work," said Harish Abbott, Co-Founder and CEO of Augment. "Together, we're giving logistics service providers a real edge by taking the grind out of freight, so their teams are freed to focus on finding new ways to grow and serve customers." The joint solution is now available to Turvo customers across industries including food & beverage, consumer packaged goods, and logistics services. Early adopters are already reporting improvements in efficiency, speed, and decision-making across their operations. To learn more, register to attend the webinar "Augment & Turvo: Bringing AI into the Flow of Freight" on Thursday, November 13th at 1:00 PM CT. About Turvo Turvo provides a collaborative Transportation Management System (TMS) application designed specifically for the supply chain. Turvo Collaboration Cloud connects freight brokers, 3PLs, shippers, and carriers to unite supply chain ecosystems, delivering outstanding customer experiences, real-time collaboration, and accelerated growth. The technology unifies internal and external systems, providing one end-to-end solution that streamlines operations, enhances analytics, and automates business processes while eliminating redundant manual tasks. Turvo's customers include some of the world's largest Fortune 500 logistics service providers and shippers, as well as small to mid-sized freight brokers. Turvo is based in Dallas, Texas, with offices in Hyderabad, India. www.turvo.com About Augment Augment is the AI productivity platform for logistics. Its flagship product, Augie, is a freight-native AI teammate that works across phone, email, portals, and systems to automate and streamline the most complex logistics workflows - supporting brokers, shippers, and carriers from order to cash. Augment has raised $110M from Redpoint Ventures, 8VC, and leading logistics funds. Learn more at www.goaugment.com. Media Contact: Samantha Foley Turvo 214.263.3547 [email protected] SOURCE Turvo