BlueGrace Logistics acquires Idaho 3PL Truk TMS, adding Pacific Northwest LTL density
A deal that converts a standing partnership into formal ownership puts BlueGrace Logistics back in acquisition mode. The Tampa, Florida-based managed logistics provider, a Warburg Pincus portfolio company, has acquired…
Key takeaways
- BlueGrace Logistics has acquired Idaho-based less-than-truckload broker Truk TMS, which concentrates its brokerage in the Pacific Northwest.
- Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.
- Truk TMS previously operated as a BlueGrace partner, so the deal formalizes an existing commercial relationship rather than being a new one.
- Truk TMS customers gain access to BlueGrace's managed logistics platform, BlueShip technology, and a carrier network of more than 250,000 providers, while keeping their same team and service.
- This is BlueGrace's third publicly disclosed acquisition in a short window, following Michigan-based STB Freight Group and Florida-based FreightCenter.
A deal that converts a standing partnership into formal ownership puts BlueGrace Logistics back in acquisition mode. The Tampa, Florida-based managed logistics provider, a Warburg Pincus portfolio company, has acquired Idaho-based Truk TMS, a less-than-truckload broker with heavy concentration in the Pacific Northwest. Financial terms were not disclosed.
From partner to subsidiary
Truk TMS had operated as a BlueGrace partner before the transaction closed, which makes the ownership shift a formalization of an existing commercial relationship rather than a clean break from the outside. Bobby Harris, BlueGrace's founder and CEO, said the deal is the natural next step in what he described as one of the company's most trusted partnerships.
Under the new structure, Truk TMS customers gain full access to BlueGrace's managed logistics platform, BlueShip technology, and a carrier network of more than 250,000 providers. BlueShip covers LTL, truckload, reefer and multimodal transportation. What that access delivers operationally will depend on how quickly integration into BlueGrace's legacy operations proceeds; no public timeline was set.
Mark Barnes, CEO of Truk TMS, said his customers keep the same team and service they have counted on, now backed by BlueGrace's full infrastructure.
Geography and scale
BlueGrace operates nine offices across the United States and Mexico and serves more than 10,000 customers. Truk TMS concentrates its LTL brokerage in the Pacific Northwest and also provides truckload and supply chain services across North America, giving BlueGrace additional coverage in a corridor absent from its prior two acquisitions.
Three deals, three geographies
The Truk TMS transaction is the third acquisition BlueGrace has publicly disclosed in a short window. In the prior year, the company bought Michigan-based 3PL STB Freight Group and Florida-based broker FreightCenter. Each deal brought a regional operator with an established customer base into the BlueGrace fold. The Pacific Northwest is the newest addition to that sequence.
BlueGrace is privately held, so no public filings or earnings disclosures will mark integration milestones. The next readable data point is a BlueGrace or Warburg Pincus update on customer count or BlueShip platform metrics as Truk TMS moves fully onto the network.
Filed via finance.yahoo.com