Carsome Announces Closing of Series E Funding Worth 4,1 Trillion Rupiah (UPDATED)

Platform developer car marketplace Carsome has announced that it has closed its $290 million Series E funding round. This acquisition increases the company's valuation to approximately $4,1 billion, solidifying them as one of the leading platforms E-commerce largest automaker in Southeast Asia.

The round was led by a number of investors, including the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), 65 Equity Partners and the Seatown Private Capital Master Fund. Also involved are Mediatek, Sunway, Gokongwei Group, YTL Group, and Taiwan Mobile. QIA was previously also rumored to be leading the latest round of funding raised by Traveloka.

Carsome plans to use the fresh funds to accelerate investments in people, products, technology, data capabilities, infrastructure and regional expansion of its “Carsome Certified” retail brand across their key markets of Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.

Previously, in September 2021, Carsome announced that it had secured new funding in series D2 worth $170 million. Simultaneously, the company also announced the acquisition of credit (debt funding) $30 million to strengthen the auto finance business. At that time the company's valuation increased to $1,3 billion.

Business in Indonesia

Carsome has been present in Indonesia since 2017 with a business model consumer-to-business (C2B). They buy used cars from the community, then auction them off to dealers in their network. However, now their business model has developed into C2B2C, not only buying, they are also selling used cars directly to consumers.

The approach taken with online-to-offline, combining web-based service capabilities with outlets experience centre scattered in various cities. Carsome Indonesia Country Head Delly Nugraha said, "After expanding our business to the B2C segment, it turns out that we see a big opportunity. In the future, because B2C is a very retail segment, in an effort to expand and improve our business, we will start expanding into strategic areas."

In mid-2021, Carsome also acquired a majority stake in PT Universal Collections to expand the business in the field of car and motorcycle auction services. As a result of this agreement, Delly was also appointed as President Director of PT Universal Collection. This corporate action allows Carsome to expand its network reach, access to financial providers and lease, and has the potential to enter the motorcycle market.

Market competition

Carsome's main competitor in the regional market is Carro. Final Carro announces C . funding in mid-2021 a $360 million led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2, followed by a number of investors including East Ventures. With their latest funding, both Carro and Carsome have reached a milestone unicorn.

The strategy being rolled out is identical, carrying the C2B2C model, Carro also has the Carro Automall service to carry out the O2O approach. In Indonesia, Carro has also taken a number of strategic actions, including carrying out the acquisition of Jualo in 2020 and became a shareholder in Allo Bank in early 2022.

As both players rely on web services to reach their final consumers, here's a comparison of the site traffic of the two services for the Indonesian market:

In Indonesia, there are actually other players, namely OLX Autos (formerly BeliMobilGue) which has now been integrated with OLX's services. The main focus is more on buying cars from consumers -- although currently some of the products that have been inspected are also starting to be sold through OLX and other channels. online marketplace other.

-

*Update: We made revisions to the error in writing "Jualo" in the article, previously "Jubelio". Jualo was acquired by Carro in 2020: Check out the news here.