Year in Review: a Crazy Year With a Clear Objective and Steady Growth

Dear Team Cleveron,

Another crazy year full of many changes – as is customary in Cleveron – has passed!

I would like to take a moment to look back on the year 2022 – a lot has happened and I am pleased that, step-by-step, we are moving closer towards achieving our goals. In my opinion, over the past year, Cleveron has become a significantly more mature, systematic, and higher quality company. By taking more meaningful steps, we are moving towards our goals. Thank you, Team Cleveron, for all your contributions – none of this would have been possible without you!

Once again, we have had to make many changes, all of which will bring us closer to our target of tenfold growth. I am extremely pleased to see that after a few years, Cleveron is back to growing profitably and it is clear that we have conquered the difficult years. Together we will be able to tackle even the most complex external factors. Everything is in our hands!

Clear focus

At the beginning of the year, we took our focus to the next level and finalised the division of the company. A 50-member autonomous vehicle development department separated from Cleveron – now we can just cheer Clevon on in their projects. This, in turn, means that we are now fully focused on the development, sales, manufacturing, and maintenance of parcel terminals and robots. Together with our customers, we will rack our brains and develop new products based on their problems and dreams. Our mission is to make people’s lives easier and give them more time through automation and our products.

Returns are currently one of the most burning issues in retail trade. To this end, we came up with a special parcel terminal in 2022 that is specifically designed for retailers for the receipt and efficient handling of large volumes of returns. With the logistics sector in mind, we designed the Cleveron 352. In addition, we upgraded the parcel terminal designed for small enterprises – Cleveron 351 Plus – which by now is already being used by several enterprises. This, however, is not all: we also created special modules for dry cleaning and completed the world’s largest parcel terminals for online furniture stores as well as hardware stores.

This year, we have also been able to place more emphasis on the development of our robotic products. These developments make Cleveron products even faster and further increase customer satisfaction and efficiency. One of the most exciting upgrades was the automatic age-identification feature added to our grocery robot, which allows the possibility to identify whether the person receiving age-restricted orders is older than the set age limit. I am also delighted that the Telia self-service store, which we opened in Rapla just before last Christmas, is actively being used and has even received the approval of senior citizens. This year is proof that our software is highly valued. Both our existing customers as well as several other enterprises that have replaced their old parcel terminal software with that offered by Cleveron attest to that fact.

Steady growth

The sale of our services is also on the rise, growing by more than 50% this year. The production volumes of parcel lockers saw an increase of a whopping 125% and more than 100 parcel robots were produced! This year, Cleveron expanded its activities to 12 countries. This means that our solutions can now be found in 51 different countries, with more than 7,000 terminals representing Cleveron worldwide. It is precisely the wide geographical footprint of Cleveron that makes its business activities extremely fascinating and challenging. I believe you will agree with me on that.

I am immensely proud of our growth rate and the addition of each new customer. This year, our solutions were implemented by many well-known global companies. Moreover, as of this year, our robot can now be found in Tahiti, with more robots joining next year. We have obtained a number of patents for our products worldwide and placed a great deal of emphasis on further improving the security of our software systems. Additionally, we are working towards keeping the ecological footprint of our activities as small as possible. A significant milestone is the fact that we won the legal battle against the China National Intellectual Property Administration in Beijing Intellectual Property Court, and against a Chinese company in the committee of the China National Intellectual Property Administration.

Unfortunately, events taking place in other parts of the world do not bring as much good news. These difficult circumstances affect us too. The war that broke out early this year came as a huge shock. We have now ceased our business activities in one country. Other challenges that we have had to face include the soaring raw material and other prices. Nevertheless, I am confident that together and by bearing in mind our objectives, we can overcome any obstacles.

What will the new year bring?

This question may be formed as an astrological prediction for the new year. The upcoming year will be characterised by increasing labour costs and soaring electricity prices. Such changes will also make our customers go over their budgets. The consumption of end-users will decrease, which in turn will affect the revenues of our customers. Today we can already see that our customers are more cautious with their cash-flow management. From a long-term perspective, automation in retail is one of the ways of optimising costs. I believe that parcel terminals will be used more and more in retail as it is the only way that retailers can sustainably keep their costs under control. Thanks to an incredible omnichannel customer experience, parcel terminals will allow retailers to earn additional revenue. Fortunately, our products and services already serve these objectives, which makes me look to the new year with an optimistic mindset when it comes to Cleveron. The coming year will also see the addition of a couple of long-awaited and much-needed products to our portfolio. Every member of Team Cleveron should know exactly which products I am talking about.

It has been a crazy year. This summer we celebrated the 15th anniversary of Cleveron and we are still the number one innovator in the Click & Collect sector. Each parcel that is delivered through a Cleveron parcel robot or terminal saves people 10 minutes of their valuable time. Therefore, in one year, we help people save 188,000 days, which is equal to just over five centuries or 51 decades. Quite an unimaginable amount of time, isn’t it? It is also worth remembering that each day Team Cleveron contributes to the delivery of millions of parcels worldwide, helping to save the most precious resource of all – time.

Thank you, Team Cleveron, for such an amazing year! I hope you enjoy a peaceful Christmas with your family and loved ones. After all, the most valuable gift is time spent with loved ones!

Wishing you a joyous holiday season and a happy new year! Let’s approach 2023 with renewed energy and vigour!