Sustainable freight management specialist Zeus has teamed up with multinational beverage company Diageo to launch hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) fuel trials in the UK.

The partnership sees Zeus handle over a third of Diageo’s UK bottle-to-recycling plant distributions, with the trial estimated to save Diageo approximately 1,800,000 kg of CO2e per year, equivalent to the amount of carbon sequestered by 2,147 acres of U.S forests in a single year.

Zeus will initially handle 50 trucks per week, fuelled by HVO, across 14 major UK transport routes, with plans to expand operations into Europe in early 2024.

In 2022, Zeus launched Freight Connect, a fully managed, low-carbon multimodal solution, combining its proprietary technology with clean HGVs fuelled with HVO, electric powered rail freight and emission reporting, backed by the Global Logistics Emissions Council (GLEC).

According to Zeus, in the last year alone, the company has seen a 400% growth in demand for its sustainable freight solutions, significantly slashing greenhouse gas emissions for leading FMCG companies by over 80%.

Sam McGuirk, Zeus chief commercial officer, said: “Diageo is a renowned global leader in the alcoholic beverages sector and being selected as a logistics partner in the UK demonstrates our capacity to serve high-profile clients and establish robust, reliable and long-lasting relationships with our customers.

“Zeus is dedicated to delivering environmentally responsible solutions and advocating for investments in alternative fuels to address the ongoing climate crisis, and our partnership with Diageo reinforces our shared allegiance to a greener future.

“We allocate significant time and resources to ensure we remain at the forefront of the latest advancements and industry updates, and the uptake we’re seeing for our sustainable freight solutions is a testament to the acclaimed reputation we have garnered.”

Philip Byrne, Diageo procurement category specialist for GB logistics, added: “It was apparent from Diageo’s first interaction with Zeus that there was an alignment on values. 2030 is quickly approaching, so Zeus’s focus on sustainability and diversity was a massive selling point. Their scalability partnered with their flexibility has been a great addition to our business and we are looking forward to what the future of our partnership has in store.”

Alongside Zeus’ Freight Connect offering, the company also launched Freight Command in July this year with Apollo Tyres, enabling enterprises to slash order-to-delivery times by over 71% by fully automating and optimising their internal freight distribution and transport operations.

Zeus was founded by 24 year-old entrepreneurs Jai Kanwar and Clemente Theotokis in 2020 with the goal of pioneering new approaches to freight efficiency. The company is placed 28th in the Top 100 Startup Index 2022, with Zeus’ co-founders also winning Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2023.

Zeus now provides freight management solutions to over 60 major enterprise customers including AB InBev, P&G, Whirlpool, Decathlon and Kraft-Heinz in 13 countries across Europe, moving approximately 300,000 tonnes of cargo per year, worth £800m.

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