Motorway's used car auction platform raises $67.7 million in Series B funding led by Index Ventures.

Motorway, may be a UK startup that permits professional car dealers to bid in an auction for privately-owned cars purchasable . The startup has had rapid success by removing tons of friction within the process. It’s now raised £48m / $67.7m during a Series B round led by Index Ventures, along side new investors BMW i Ventures and Unbound. Existing investors Latitude and Marchmont Ventures also participated. The funding are going to be wont to extend its platform and grow the present 160-strong team.

The startup allows consumers to sell their car for up to £1,000, by uploading its details via a smartphone. Over 3,000 professional car dealers then bid for the vehicle during a daily online auction. the very best offer wins the car, which is then collected for free of charge by the winning dealer inside 24 hours. 

Motorway says it's sold 65,000 cars since its launch in 2017 and seen sales hit £50m in May 2021 alone, £2.5m of transactions each day , and quite 4,000 completed car sales a month. With only 5% of all vehicles within the UK sold online immediately , there's many headroom for this     market to grow.

Tom Leathes, CEO of Motorway, said: “For half a century, inefficient offline processes have led to bad deals and a nasty experience for both car sellers and car dealers. Motorway has fundamentally changed a broken experience where everyone finishes up dissatisfied – and we’ve transformed it with a superior online experience where everybody wins. ablation the middlemen leaves both the buyer and dealer with a far better deal, all from home and without the strain. 

Our incredible growth thus far is testament to our specialise in delivering more value through technology – and this investment will provide us with the fuel to require Motorway to subsequent level.”

Danny Rimer, Partner at Index Ventures, said: “We’re always looking to take a position in companies that are truly disrupting an industry and meeting a true customer need. we've found that in Motorway. The team has built an incredibly powerful platform, underpinned by great technology and a deep understanding of the challenges both consumers and car dealers face. Motorway has quickly become the primary port of involve tens of thousands of individuals selling their car.” 

Motorway previously raised £14m in venture funding since it had been founded by Tom Leathes, Harry Jones and Alex Buttle in 2017.

Speaking to me over interview Leathes added: “COVID has been a true accelerator of something that was already happening. The car industry is moving online and that’s partly about people buying their next car online, but it’s also about dealers changing their behavior, how they are doing business, where they buy their cars. 

It forced that change which they resisted for an extended time, and now they’re embracing it, so it’s a fundamental shift within the industry. And this is often why we see such a huge opportunity to supply the rails to assist each side of the marketplace to maneuver online.”

Rimer added: “It’s rare that you simply have founders who have worked together across multiple successful and fewer successful startups who have that connective tissue and success, and are now going for a way bigger opportunity. 

The business model is basically a crucial one for us because rather than owning inventory then having to urge obviate your inventory, kind of just like the difference between Nat-a-Porter and Farfetch. Motorway’s marketplace is simply like Farfetch – they don’t have any inventory, which suggests that just by merely making that platform happen for buyers and sellers, they win. So there’s tons less risk related to what the cash goes to be used for when building the business.”