# Cartage Scales Autonomous Freight Agent Wilson Across Shippers and Hires in Operations and Growth

**Author:** Zero G Talent
**Published:** 2026-11-09
**Category:** sales-marketing
**Tags:** yc-hiring, logistics ai, supply chain, workflow automation, operations, sales

[Read on Zero G Talent](https://zerogtalent.com/blog/cartage-scales-autonomous-freight-agent-wilson-across-shippers-and-hires-in-operations-and-growth)

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[Cartage](https://zerogtalent.com/ai-companies/cartage) builds Wilson, an autonomous freight coordinator that manages logistics communications, quotes, load bookings, and shipment tracking for manufacturers and distributors. Rather than asking logistics providers to switch software systems, Cartage deploys Wilson directly into a customer's existing communication channels, giving the agent a company email address, dedicated phone number, and system login credentials.

According to an interview in [Business of Home](https://businessofhome.com/articles/your-next-logistics-hire-might-be-an-ai-agent), Wilson handles 88 percent of shipments end to end without human intervention, with approximately 10 percent requiring customer adjustments and 2.2 percent requiring the Cartage team to step in. The company bypassed generic foundation models to train its own proprietary model, Cartage_1, using real logistics workflows to coordinate freight.

## Automating the Freight Desk Without System Migrations

Freight operations traditionally depend on constant back-and-forth communication over email and phone. When carriers, brokers, and shippers use separate transportation management systems (TMS), operations teams spend hours manually re-entering data, chasing quotes, and monitoring check-ins.

Wilson automates that execution layer. Working directly for the shipper under their domain, the agent handles quoting, tender acceptance, track-and-trace, freight auditing, and exceptions around the clock. In an appearance on the [Tech for Supply Chains Podcast](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GrBai869GFo), co-founder [Abdul Basharat](https://zerogtalent.com/people/abdul-basharat) explained that Wilson acts as an operator model: rather than demanding API integrations that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, Wilson logs directly into older ERP or AS400 systems to extract data and trigger updates.

Adoption has spread across industries with complex freight profiles. As reported by [Food & Beverage Magazine](https://www.fb101.com/cartage-ai-wilson-autonomous-food-beverage-logistics-24-7-abc7e5ba37), mushroom producer Giorgio Foods deployed Wilson across more than 1,600 trips and 7,000 emails, replacing 8 to 10 hours of daily dispatch coordination. Confectionery brand Mid-Day Squares used the platform to manage hundreds of inbound shipments and gather quotes. In home furnishings, brands like Sundays and mattress maker Saatva use the agent to locate shipments across multi-leg transit routes and field 24/7 delivery inquiries.

In a video with [Salesbricks](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttHrc-1-VSw), the team noted that they are expanding Wilson's capabilities into ocean freight and international shipping, including onboarding their first customer in Mexico and adding Spanish language support.

## Logistics Operators and Software Builders

Cartage was founded by three operators who split their experience between software development and physical freight operations.

* [Abdul Basharat](https://zerogtalent.com/people/abdul-basharat), CEO, trained as a military pilot before entering management consulting. He joined logistics software firm Rose Rocket as product lead for network and product-led growth, later helping launch B2B platforms at Pathstream.
* [Josh Lampen](https://zerogtalent.com/people/josh-lampen), CTO, served on Canada's National Water Polo team and worked in management consulting before becoming a founding engineer on Rose Rocket's platform team, where he built the company's first workflow engine. He also engineered systems at Together.
* [Harman Sahota](https://zerogtalent.com/people/harman-sahota), COO, grew up in family trucking operations in British Columbia. On [The Freight Coach](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QxcXgVPmGSA), Sahota explained that he started brokering freight as a teenager before bootstrapping Westcore Logistics, an industrial project logistics company that grew to $50 million in revenue with four employees.

Cartage raised a $3.3 million seed round led by Y Combinator, Garage Capital, Wayfinder Ventures, Northside Ventures, Pioneer Fund, and Ritual Capital, with participation from Paul Graham and Lever founder Nate Smith, according to [FreightWaves](https://www.freightwaves.com/news/cartage-secures-3-3m-to-support-shippers-and-carriers-with-automation). As reported by [Business of Home](https://businessofhome.com/articles/your-next-logistics-hire-might-be-an-ai-agent), the company has raised close to $10 million in total funding as it scales.

## Hiring for Human-in-the-Loop Operations and GTM

Cartage operates as a 12-person team headquartered in San Francisco with presence in Vancouver. Every customer workflow is supervised by an internal team watching live operations to maintain accuracy while feeding system failures back into engineering.

To bridge the gap between autonomous dispatch and manual escalations, Cartage is hiring an [Autonomy Operations Architect](https://zerogtalent.com/ai-jobs/cartage/autonomy-operations-architect-87895) in San Francisco or Vancouver. The role involves sitting at the boundary between physical logistics and Wilson, monitoring live workflows, stepping in when autonomy fails, producing signal for product and engineering teams, and maintaining the autonomy matrix and weekly reality reports.

On the revenue side, the company is recruiting a [Growth Lead](https://zerogtalent.com/ai-jobs/cartage/growth-lead-116077) to own top-of-funnel pipeline generation. The role calls for using tools such as Claude Code to build internal systems, automate workflows, and deploy growth experiments. Supporting customer acquisition, Cartage is also hiring an onsite [Sales Development Representative](https://zerogtalent.com/ai-jobs/cartage/sales-development-representative-77197) in San Francisco to conduct high-volume cold outreach and generate sales pipeline for Wilson among manufacturers and distributors.

## Open Roles at Cartage

| Role | Location | Work Mode | Salary |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [Growth Lead](https://zerogtalent.com/ai-jobs/cartage/growth-lead-116077) | Vancouver, BC, CA / San Francisco, CA, US / Remote (US) | Remote | $80,000 – $180,000 USD |
| [Autonomy Operations Architect](https://zerogtalent.com/ai-jobs/cartage/autonomy-operations-architect-87895) | Vancouver, BC, CA / San Francisco, CA, US | Onsite | $50,000 – $80,000 USD |
| [Sales Development Representative](https://zerogtalent.com/ai-jobs/cartage/sales-development-representative-77197) | San Francisco, CA, US | Onsite | $60,000 – $90,000 USD |

[See all open roles at Cartage](https://zerogtalent.com/ai-companies/cartage)

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*Source: [Zero G Talent](https://zerogtalent.com), the job board for space, defense, AI, robotics and frontier-tech companies.*