CarDekho, an Indian car search platform, closed a $250m round of funding.

The round, which included $200m Series E equity and $50m debt and valued the company at $1.2 billion, was led by LeapFrog Investments with participation from Canyon Partners, Mirae Asset, Franklin Templeton and Harbor Spring Capital and existing investors Sequoia Capital India and Sunley House.

The company intends to use the funds to accelerate growth in the Used Car transactions,  Financial services and insurance businesses, build product and technology functions, increase brand awareness, and expand into new markets.

Founded in 2008, headquartered in Jaipur, and led by Mr. Amit Jain, CEO, CarDekho Group currently operates various Indian auto portals such as CarDekho.com, Gaadi.com, ZigWheels.com, BikeDekho.com, PowerDrift.com and more. CarDekho Gaadi has a presence in 100+ markets across India where customers can sell their used cars. CarDekho currently has 3000+ certified pre-owned cars for customers to buy from its portal. Its digital platforms, ‘New Auto’, and its financial services businesses are already profitable and its insurance business, InsuranceDekho.com, has crossed the breakeven point.

The company will be expanding its Used Car retail transactions business geographically and is set to increase its catalogue to 10,000 cars in the near future. CarDekho plans to expand across India with retail hubs that will focus on both used car buying and certified pre-owned car retail transactions with customers. The team is currently present in India, Indonesia and Philippines and its auto and non-auto products are currently used in more than 30 countries globally.

The company expanded its presence in Indonesia under the brand name OTO, acquired the Philippines operations of Carmudi thereby expanding its operations to two Southeast Asian countries.

FinSMEs

13/10/2021