It started its operations in Memphis International Airport, Tennessee in 1973. FedEx offered courier pack, envelope delivery in both two-day delivery and overnight delivery options. FedEx had started its services with fourteen Dassault Falcon 20s connecting nearly twenty-five cities in the U.S.
The first day of operations was April 17, 1973 and that night only 18 packages were carried on board. Though everyone was excited to see this new service being started but it did not translate into business activity. This caused the company to lose nearly $1 million per month.
Fred Smith found it difficult to run the company with such huge losses in the very beginning. Soon he tried to raise capital to pay his staff and other outstanding expenses. But after failing for a short while, he went on to convince nearly twenty of the leading risk venture capitalists in the country and was able to raise $60 million in capital. Thus FedEx had become one of the highest financed start-up companies in U.S. venture capital history