Fremont, California: Smiota Inc., is now certified as a Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) under the Western Minority Supplier Development Council (WMSDC). 

The WMSDC supports minority-owned communities in Northern California, Nevada, and Hawaii. Once a business is certified as an MBE, the council works to advance business opportunities and connect the business to corporate members. The organization has created over 760,000 jobs and trained over 300 minority-owned businesses. 

The National Minority Supplier Development Council’s Minority Business Enterprise (MBE) Certification is the gold standard for Ethnic Minority Business Certification in the United States. 

This new certification comes after a year of explosive growth for Smiota. 

“This is a perfect time to have received this certification,” said Manju Kashi, the Founder and CEO of Smiota. “We have so many great partnerships and the MSDC community is a great addition for our growing business.”

Most notably, Smiota has expanded into new industries, introducing solutions such as:

• Unique software for custom last yard delivery solutions 
• Secure buy online and pick up in store system for retailers, minimizing touchpoints with shoppers
• Contactless click-and-collect systems for libraries
• Automation for package delivery systems at residential locations
• And more

Smiota is the first Locker as a Service company of its kind to receive this certification. 

“Because of MSDC, minority owned businesses, like Smiota, have more opportunities than ever before to offer our Smart Locker Platform and services to a wider customer base that are helping minority owned businesses,” said Waheed Rashed, Smiota’s Chief Marketing Officer. “The last 12 months was huge for our company and access to the MSDC network is only going to improve our company’s trajectory.”

Smiota provides last mile delivery services that promise a complete chain of custody, security, and a great user experience. It’s flagship solution is a Smart Locker to automate the exchange of physical goods. The company’s goal is to provide the most viable, best in class solutions for various industry applications such as BOPIS (Buy Online Pickup in Store), Fortune 1000 enterprises, socially responsible organizations and more where delivery as a service is required. With a leading edge Smiota Cloud Platform, the company offers easy integration features, multiple workflows, customization and more through secure APIs for partners and third party developers.