Ryan Petersen, Founder & CEO of Flexport
Global trade isn’t exactly known for agility. But Ryan Petersen has spent the last decade proving it doesn’t have to be slow and is coming to Beanstalk to share what he's learned so far.
As the founder of Flexport, Ryan has been leading a company that’s rethinking how goods move across the world. He’s raised over $2.5 billion in funding and led the business to a peak valuation of $8 billion.
This year, Flexport reported $2.1 billion in revenue—a 30 percent increase over the previous year. That kind of growth is rare in a freight market that’s cooled off. It doesn’t just reflect timing. It speaks to how Ryan builds systems that keep working under pressure.
He’s also the kind of operator who doesn’t hesitate when the pressure is public. In 2021, when the Port of Los Angeles was gridlocked, he tweeted five tactical solutions. One of them was implemented within 48 hours. The press called it “the tweetstorm that saved Christmas.”
That same instinct shows up in how Flexport responds to global crises. Through its nonprofit arm, Flexport.org, the company has supported emergency airlifts—donating logistics services to relief efforts in Puerto Rico in 2017 and Ukraine in 2022.
Ryan also speaks five languages: Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, French, and English. It’s part of what lets him work fluidly across markets, teams, and time zones.
He brings a rare mix of speed, clarity, and scale— the kind of thinking that moves categories forward, and we’re ready for it at Beanstalk.
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