SAN FRANCISCO — A few tech startups want to build trucks that drive themselves. That's an earnings play for the future.

Until then, other tech ventures aim to earn a slice of the nation's $800 billion trucking pie today by using technology to connect drivers with shipments.

Convoy, a nearly two-year-old Seattle-based startup, has convinced a growing number of high profile investors — including Bill Gates, through his firm Cascade Investment — that its solution is worth banking on. CEO Dan Lewis announced Tuesday that Convoy had raised $62 million in Series B funding, bringing its total to $80 million.

Leading the round was tech incubator Y Combinator, which until now has not invested in a venture that it has not helped start. “By improving trucking, Convoy is improving the foundation of our economy,” YC Continuity parnter Anu Hariharan said in a statement.

Other investors in the round include Sen. Bill Bradley and media mogul Barry Diller. Investors in Convoy's first round included Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

"We aim to cut down on the 40% of the time that trucks are empty, and even if we're 1% more efficient that would save 400 million gallons of fuel," Lewis tells USA TODAY. "This wasn’t possible until 2015 or so, when many truckers got upgrades to smartphones with their phone plans. That's when we could start tracking where people were in real time."

Lewis adds that a big appeal of his app for many truckers is the ability to not only avoid driving empty, but also plan a loaded route that steers them back to where they live. "Truckers are always eager to get home as efficiently as they can, ideally while working," he says.

Convoy makes its money by taking a percentage of the fee charged by the truck drivers to companies looking to move their freight around regions.

Earlier this year, Uber made a jump into this space with Uber Freight, which is overseen by Lior Ron. Ron was a co-founder of self-driving truck company Otto; his partner in that venture, Anthony Levandowski, became head of Uber's autonomous car program when Uber bought Otto for around $690 million last summer.

But that investment ran into a guardrail earlier this year when Google, Levandowski's previous employer, accused Uber of using 14,000 files stolen by Levandowski before he left Google to help build its light detection and ranging sensors (LiDAR). Uber has denied the claim, and the case is expected to go to trial this fall.

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"I don't see that Uber has a particular advantage here (in trucking), as compared to the ride-hailing business where it clearly does," Lewis says when asked about the new competitor.

Convoy has more than 300 shippers as customers, including large brands such as Unilever and Anheuser-Busch. Around 10,000 trucking companies are in the Convoy network.

Lewis says he plans to use the new round of funding to expand operations to the East and Southeast, both extremely busy trucking corridors.

"This is where the impact starts," he says, "when we go from niche to mainstream."

Follow USA TODAY tech reporter Marco della Cava on Twitter.