Co-Founder | Climate Tech for Freight Forwarders

Coming from freight forwarding, B2B software or startups? Let’s build Refine together.

Freight is getting a new commercial layer.

Companies are under increasing pressure to reduce emissions from air, ocean and road freight. At the same time, sustainable aviation fuel certificates, maritime biofuel certificates and other book-and-claim instruments make it possible for companies to support lower-carbon fuels and claim documented emissions reductions, without changing how their goods are shipped.

Refine is building the infrastructure that lets freight forwarders sell this under their own brand.

Our white-label platform takes forwarders from shipment data and calculation to customer offer, transaction, certificates and documentation. Forwarders strengthen customer relationships and open a new revenue stream, without owning aircraft, ships or trucks.

Think of Refine as the infrastructure behind the freight forwarder, not another marketplace competing for their customers.

Where we are today

Refine is early, but not starting from a blank sheet.

The key building blocks are in place to build the full product, and the concept is being developed with people across freight forwarding, sustainable fuels and book-and-claim infrastructure.

The initial focus is upper mid-sized freight forwarders in Denmark and the Nordics, with the ambition to build across Europe.

The next step is completing the product and turning it into customer pilots, first transactions and integrations with selected partners.

Who this is for

Not an employee role. A co-founder position with equity and responsibility from day one.

There are several ways to fit. You might bring experience in

• Freight forwarding: You understand the customers, the commercial opportunities and the daily workflows, whether from operations, sales or management.
• B2B SaaS and startups: You have helped build products, win early customers or grow a business.
• Software and product: You turn customer needs into software that works, through engineering, product, UX or integrations.

You do not need to cover all three. Strong experience in one area, combined with initiative and a willingness to learn, is a good starting point.

If you come from freight forwarding, you do not need to code. If you come from software or SaaS, you do not need freight experience.

You do not need to know everything about SAF certificates, book-and-claim or freight emissions already. That part you will learn along the way.

Your role

With a freight forwarding or commercial background, you could lead customer pilots, build industry relationships and make sure Refine fits how forwarders actually work.

With a technical or product background, you could lead platform development, turn customer feedback into features and build integrations with logistics systems.

Either way, you help define the product, the business model and where/how Refine should and should not compete.

What I bring

I am Thomas, founder of Refine. I bring the domain expertise: sustainable fuels, SAF certificates, book-and-claim and the markets behind them.

I have 7 years of commercial experience in climate tech, across Power-to-X, e-fuels, biogas, CCS and carbon markets.

I work full-time on Refine. Responsibilities will be divided around our strengths.

Why now?

More companies want to reduce the emissions from their freight.

Their freight forwarders are increasingly expected to help them do it.

But most freight forwarders do not want to build their own supplier network, certificate infrastructure, calculation engine, documentation flow and customer-facing product from scratch.

That creates an opportunity.

The underlying solutions are becoming available. The market infrastructure is maturing. Customer demand is starting to move.

What is still missing is a simple way for thousands of freight forwarders to turn all of that into a new business line they can sell under their own brand.

The setup

• Genuine co-founder position with meaningful equity, split based on experience, commitment and responsibilities
• Unpaid at this stage
• Ideally based in or around Aarhus, but the right person matters more than the postcode
• Open to starting alongside your current work, with a shared ambition to go full-time as founder fit and traction develop