South-east Asia’s used-car marketplace Carro is raising about US$100 million (S$136 million) as it gears up for a stock-market debut, betting that new funds will cement it as the region’s top player.
The company is speaking with investors for a pre-IPO (initial public offering) funding round which could raise its valuation to more than US$1.5 billion, chief executive officer Aaron Tan said in an interview.
Carro has about 4,500 employees and counts SoftBank Group as well as Singapore’s GIC and Temasek among its investors.
Features of Carro Platform:
Carro, platform allows consumers and dealers to buy and sell vehicles that are used.
The platform is a way for those who feels it’s a pinch to have a new car with elevated interest rates and inflation are pushing up the prices of car loans, making them less affordable. That is where Carro is making the difference as users have options to purchase Cars that are affordable and have latest models available.
The Singapore-based start-up is also operating in a highly competitive market, one that’s resistant to change.
Mr Aaron Tan, who is the CEO founded his start-up in 2015 with two fellow Carnegie Mellon graduates, is betting on innovations to stand out from the pack.
The CEO demonstrated a tool for instance he called the Shazam of engines, which analyses the health of a second-hand car from the sound of its motor. And the start-up offers a five-day no-questions-asked return policy, unheard-of in many parts of Asia.
Carro intends to expand its operations in Japan and Hong Kong this year.
Over the past nine years, Carro and main rival Carsome have invested hundreds of millions of dollars to acquire inventory, build out delivery networks, set up refurbishment centres and fit out used-car showrooms.
To get shoppers more comfortable with buying online, the upstarts have also introduced Amazon-like features, such as no-quibble returns and delivery within a few days.
To help with that, Carro built a QR code dashboard to track cars at each stage of the trading, refurbishment and delivery process.
On average, cars stay with Carro for about 26 days, while Malaysia-based Carsome says it takes about 45 days to sell a vehicle to a consumer. That compares with about 46 days for Carvana, their US-listed peer.
“It’s easy to do this at a ‘mom-and-pop shop’ level,” Mr Tan said. “But if you want to do this at scale, you need investments, you need a lot of space, you need the manpower and of course the tech and systems.”
(From StraitsTimes)
