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WiseTech makes software that helps freight forwarders and logistics companies move goods across the world.
WiseTech Global is a software company that sells one main product: CargoWise, a cloud platform that freight forwarders and logistics companies use to run their whole business. A freight forwarder is the middleman who arranges to move your stuff — say, a container of sneakers from Vietnam to a warehouse in Ohio — and CargoWise is the system that tracks that container, files the customs paperwork, books space on ships and planes, and handles the billing. Think of it as the operating system for global trade. Customers pay a subscription per user, usually on a yearly contract, and once a logistics firm runs everything through CargoWise, ripping it out is painful, so they tend to stay for a long time.
The company is headquartered in Sydney, Australia, but its customers are everywhere — big multinational forwarders and smaller local ones. Roughly the vast majority of revenue comes from these CargoWise subscriptions, with the rest from smaller add-on software tools the company has bought over the years and stitched into the platform. WiseTech grows in two main ways: it signs up new customers, and it sells more modules to existing ones. It also buys smaller logistics software companies to fold their features in — a roll-up strategy that has been a big part of its story. It was founded in 1994 by Richard White, a former freight forwarder who got frustrated with the clunky software his industry used and decided to build his own.
The business throws off a lot of cash because software costs little to deliver once it's built, and WiseTech mostly reinvests that cash into product development and acquisitions rather than paying big dividends. The stock has been volatile in recent years, partly because of governance questions around its founder's role and disclosure, and partly because the whole software sector swings with interest rates. Still, the core idea is simple: world trade keeps happening, freight forwarders need software to run it, and WiseTech has become the default choice for many of them.
Saved answer · last researched 11 Oct 2026