John “JT” Engstrom, a long-time transportation and logistics analyst and Wall Street investment banker, has joined FreightWaves as Chief Strategy Officer. In the role, Engstrom will oversee the Market Expert team of analysts, FreightWaves’ proprietary research group Freight Intel, and the commercial engagement team. Engstrom will also help with corporate strategy, partnerships, and prepare the company for the next stage of growth.
“I have known John for three years and he has served in the role of an unofficial advisor and resource to FreightWaves from our earliest days,” said Craig Fuller, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of FreightWaves. “His understanding of the freight market is unparalleled. He has built out an extensive network of resources and contacts that will expand our reach and insights into the market. I am excited that he is joining the executive team at our Chattanooga, TN, headquarters.”
For the past five years, Engstrom worked as an equities analyst and investment banker at Stifel covering transportation and logistics under the mentorship of industry veteran John Larkin. Prior to Stifel, Engstrom was a management consultant at Oliver Wyman, where his accounts included a cross section of transportation operating companies, private equity firms, industry associations, consumer retailers, and industrial manufacturers. Engstrom’s first job out of college was writing route optimization models and algorithms for truckload carriers.
Upon his departure from Stifel, Engstrom commented that “it is with a heavy heart that I will be leaving an industry institution that is so deeply ingrained at the intersection of banking, transportation, and technology. I cherish the experiences and knowledge gained during my tenure at the firm and look forward to building on the deep relationships of my mentors and partners. The opportunity to join FreightWaves is unparalleled, incredibly exciting, and a result of my development under the guidance of industry veterans.”
Commenting on Engstrom’s appointment, Larkin stated, “Engstrom is the brightest, hardest-working, and most insightful of my many understudies. I know he will knock the cover off the ball at FreightWaves, my favorite and the most difficult to replicate of all the freight tech companies to come on the scene in recent years. The sky’s the limit for John and for FreightWaves.”
FreightWaves has been building up a proprietary research and market insights team to complement its fundamental data and media content. The goal of those efforts is to develop deeper insights into how the freight market operates and how different issues, opportunities, innovations, and the market will impact them. The research is available without additional cost to SONAR subscribers.
FreightWaves is one of the fastest-growing enterprise software-as-a-service (SaaS) companies in the world. In less than three years, FreightWaves has become the leading provider of data and analytics for the global freight market. FreightWaves’ team of 150 full-time employees captures, models, and interprets near-time data from over a thousand sources to provide participants with the fastest insights into the global freight market. The company offers the fastest data in the industry and the most complete view across all modes of freight transportation. SONAR, the company’s SaaS offering, is a market dashboard that provides companies involved in transportation with access to datasets that help them optimize their routing, pricing, and planning decisions.
FreightWaves is also the largest media provider for the freight industry in the world. FreightWaves.com offers 40+ news articles per day, providing commentary and analysis for freight transportation; FreightWaves TV is the first and only streaming TV network dedicated to transportation and logistics; and FreightWaves Radio is a weekly radio-show hosted on Sirius XM radio offering commentary and insights on freight transportation topics.
