Vanilla Steel - Founders Letter 2025
Vanilla Steel
December 2025

Looking back at 2025,
building for 2026.

Dear partners,

2025 has been a challenging year for steel trading – marked by volatility, softer demand, and continuous pressure on margins across the entire value chain. Yet, despite this environment, we made strong progress together.

This year we focused heavily on building tools that make buying and selling steel more efficient. We strengthened our sales and operations processes, expanded our tech and data teams, and developed our own ERP system tailored specifically to the steel industry.

We launched the first AI-powered RFQ tool, enhanced the matching engine for listings and inventory, and built an AI-supported logistics quoting tool to improve transparency and freight cost calculation.

Meeting many of you at Blechexpo reaffirmed how valuable your feedback is – it directly shapes the solutions we build.

Looking ahead to 2026, our mission remains clear: helping the industry navigate a skilled-labor shortage, persistent cost pressures, and data that is still far from being fully used.

Thank you for your trust, your collaboration, and the conversations that continue to inspire us.

With warm regards,

Simon Zühlke

Clifford Ondara