Peach Cars Raises $5M In Seed Investment Led By Japan-Based UTEC
Peach Cars has received a $5 million seed round funding led by Japan-based The University of Tokyo Edge Capital Partners (UTEC) and other angel investors. This is one of the largest seed rounds in Africa’s mobility industry. The funding is expected to go into growing Peach Car’s business, its team, and expanding tech solutions.
Since its inception in November 2020, Peach Cars has been on a path to revolutionize car ownership in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The founders, from their 10+ years of combined experiences in SSA, engaging friends and industry peers, saw an opportunity in the market.
Creating Information Symmetry in Locally-Used Car Market
Despite accounting for 90 percent of car sales in SSA, the locally-used car market in the region was fraught with information asymmetry which resulted in mistrust between sellers and buyers. The lack of information on the true vehicle condition, among other things such as fraud and unsecured payments, piled on to the bad customer experience for locally-used car buyers. Peach Cars was consequently founded to bring full transparency (information symmetry) to the car ownership process.
“We knew that if we could create information symmetry between buyers and sellers, we could provide a better, efficient, and sustainable way to buy and sell locally-used cars in Kenya. The name Peach represents our mission. We would like to be a place where people can find their own peaches (sweet deals), not lemons (bitter deals). The trust already exists in tightly connected communities in Kenya, we are therefore looking to systematize it to the wider car market with a new approach. Transparency is at the heart of every interaction between our customers and our brand,” says Kaoru Kaganoi, CEO and founder of Peach Cars.
Tech Integration into Business Processes
“We pride ourselves in giving our customers a 360-degree view of the car they’re buying or selling so they can make informed decisions. This is what has enabled us to grow in the past two years to become one of the leading locally-used car dealerships. We have also adopted technology throughout our entire business processes – from vehicle inspections to marketing and customer service,” says Zachary Petroni, COO and co-founder of Peach Cars.
“As the matchmaker between used-car buyers and sellers, we are building the necessary infrastructure to power improved trust, transparency, and the customer experience in the growing used‐vehicle market across Sub‐Saharan Africa. The $5 million funding will go a long way in enabling this. We are building a strong team and tech base to provide better customer-centric services and transparent information for our customers to find their own peaches while making Peach Cars a great place for top talent. It’s an honor to have our investors, advisors, and customers believing in and supporting our mission,” says Kaoru.
Pioneering a Customer-Centric Used-Car Platform
“Peach is pioneering the most customer-centric, trustworthy, and advanced used-car platform in Sub-Saharan Africa by coupling their operational excellence with smart IoT devices and data analysis. UTEC is proud to partner with Peach, and foster Japan-Africa collaboration by augmenting Peach with Japanese automotive expertise and network” – says Kiran Mysore, Principal at UTEC, who joined the Board of Directors of Peach Cars.
The other angel investors include Shintaro Yamada (CEO, Founder – Mercari), Peter Kenevan (VP, Head of Japan – PayPal), and Hiroaki Ohta (GP – Waseda University Ventures/ former CEO – ACSL).
The company has already developed a smart engine check device that utilizes Peach’s proprietary-built software to automate the car inspection process. The 225-point inspection system, benchmarked against Japanese auto industry standards, as 80% of cars in Kenya are of Japanese make, gives a complete and accurate report of all the systems in the car.
“We’re also looking to launch a near-fully automated and sophisticated inspection center in 2024 with Peach-proprietary technologies as well as developing a web tool that will allow car sellers to send their car details and photos to us without much hassle. Part of the funding will also go into growing our talent base. The right tools require the right people. We will be hiring talent that will help in expanding our operations,” says Zachary.
