CarDekho acquires Help On Wheels

Girnar Software Pvt. Ltd, which runs online auto classifieds portal Cardekho, has acquired roadside assistance firm Help On Wheels Pvt. Ltd for an undisclosed amount, the firm said in a statement on Thursday.

The acquisition comes two weeks after Girnar Software raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Google Capital.

According to a February 2016 Deloitte report, the used car market in India is currently as big as the new car market. The report adds that first-time buyers in India are increasingly opting for pre-owned cars. Firms operating in the used car space have been raising funds to compete in one of the fastest growing business verticals.

Girnar’s acquisition will help the company compete against rival Cartrade.com (MXC Solutions Pvt. Ltd), which raised ₹ 950 crore in funding led by Singapore-based investment firm Temasek and March Capital, with participation from existing investor Warburg Pincus. The company had raised $30 million in 2014 from a group of investors that included Tiger Global, Warburg and Canaan Partners.

Help On Wheels was founded by Lalit Parmar and Nirmal Mitra in 2014 and has a client base of 50,000, the statement said. All its employees will be absorbed by Cardekho.

“Help On Wheels will help our roadside assistance business scale faster, not only by giving us an established service network and client base, but also through the decades of experience its team brings to the table. We will focus on creating the market for roadside assistance, which is a multibillion dollar market in the US and Europe. We believe it has massive potential in India where the roadside assistance infrastructure is poor,” said Ankur Agarwal, chief executive of the car owners business vertical at Cardekho.

Girnar Software, which operates other portals, including Zigwheels, Gaadi.com, Pricedekho.com and Bikedekho.com, had raised $50 million in January 2015 from Hillhouse, Tybourne and Sequoia Capital. It was valued at $300 million then. Further rounds of funding were raised from Tata Sons chairman emeritus Ratan Tata and HDFC Bank Ltd.

Cardekho had said that it would make up to five acquisitions by March 2016, Mint reported on 30 November 2015.

In the last two years, the firm has made four acquisitions—Drishya360, Gaadi.com, Zigwheels and BuyingIQ.

“With our operational experience and Cardekho’s technology prowess, we intend to bring innovative products in this area. Our focus will be to scale up the business in a sustainable way by using technology to deliver great service quality at minimal costs,” said Parmar in a statement.

Other auto classifieds start-ups include Droom Technology Pvt. Ltd, which raised $16 million in a round led by Lightbox in July last year, and Truebil (Paix Technology Pvt. Ltd), which raised $500,000 in its first funding round from KAE Capital in June last year.