Online car financing marketplace lands $3 million seed round

A year-old online car financing marketplace has raised a $3 million seed round led by Carthona Capital.

Driva, which launched in early 2020, hopes to take on comparison sites such as Finder and Canstar, offering car buyers lending options from more than 30 auto financers.

The fresh round of investors includes Stephen Das, founder of US consumer loan marketplace, Credible, and Nicolas Scudamore-Smith, co-founder of online automotive spare parts business, SparesBox, which he sold to Repco in 2019.

Driva co-founders and co-CEOs Scott Montarello and William Brown say they’ve built a proprietary database of thousands of lender credit policy and pricing data points that enable their platform to instantly match a customer with their lowest rate and eligible vehicle finance options.

“Driva’s platform allows customers to compare and apply for rates from nearly 30 lenders. Customers are showing a clear preference for the new breed of lenders over the big banks,” Montarello said.

“When the choice sits squarely with the customer and options are easy to compare, the lender offering the best outcome will naturally win out.”

Building white label partnerships

Brown said the funds raised will be used to develop partnerships with businesses looking to easily add car finance to their offering. The platform’s API allows for a white label service with partner businesses.

“We’ve seen increased regulatory scrutiny and frequently shifting lender policies make it particularly difficult for businesses looking to provide car finance to meet compliance requirements or provide a good customer experience,” he said.

“Driva has made available its pricing technology to a number of partners. This empowers them to earn finance revenue and provide the customer experience Australian consumers are demanding with one simple integration”.

Carthona Capital’s James Synge said there was an overall trend in fintech towards increased transparency, value for money and choice for consumers.

“We see Driva as directly addressing these needs in the car financing space which is particularly untouched compared to other financing verticals,” he said.