ComparaCar desires to overcome the market by doing what WebMotors doesn’t

The car search and comparison market (metasearch) for cars in Brazil already has its big fish, with sites like WebMotors and iCars occupying large slices of the pie and concentrating the online vehicle sales marketplace. However, the Compare wants to grab its share, but with an eye on a front that most players are not paying attention to yet: vehicle rental.

“More than a metasearch, we think about Compare as a mobility ecosystem, serving both those who want to buy a vehicle and those who want to purchase one in the subscription format”, explains Alan Lewkowicz, co-founder and CEO of the company, in an interview with startups.

Despite also investing in a comprehensive base of vehicle sales advertisements, the company hopes to capitalize on the potential of subscription cars, which currently handle around 100,000 cars per month and have around 8 to 10,000 subscriptions made every month. months. “(The market) is growing substantially, and our expectation is to bite a big slice of this cake”, completes Alan.

The numbers are on Alan’s side. According to the yearbook of the Brazilian Association of Car Rental Companies (ABLA), vehicle rental grew 33.5% in 2021. The sector’s gross revenue jumped from R$ 17.6 billion in 2020 to R$ 23.5 billion in the year past, the highest growth in five years.

To support this proposal, the company is establishing partnerships with the main car subscription companies in the country, with a revenue model based on commissions on the deals closed by the platform. In addition, the company plans to add its own layer of services, including insurance and financing products.

“Most (rental) players today fly solo in customer acquisition, and they were excited about our proposal. We want to be a gateway to this market”, highlights the CEO.

Despite being new to the market (less than a year), the Compare already have some numbers. According to Daniel Z. Chohfi, CMO of the startup, today the platform already has more than 1.5 million cars listed with around 25,000 monthly hits. “We are still in testing, but we will intensify our go-to-market by the end of the year. We want to reach big numbers”, highlights Daniel.

To fund these goals, the company raised capital, raising a seed investment of R$3 million from a pool of Brazilian and European venture builders, including group executives. Rocket Internet. The company currently has 13 employees and is investing in product adjustments, with an eye on a possible round in 2023.

information and independence

Despite the rent part being a differential, the Compare also claims to bring its own flavor to compete with the big car sales portals: information. At the base of the startup are offers from all major players, but not all offers.

According to Marcio Klepacz, co-founder and CTO of Compare, the startup team curates the ads, including additional data to optimize search accuracy and remove unworthy offers. “While other portals focus on ad volume, we want to focus on quality, bringing more detailed information about the vehicle and even purchase conditions, such as financing”, highlights the CTO.

It is also in the company’s pipeline to include its own resources, such as a comprehensive metasearch for motorcycles and a resource called CarMatch, which allows users to find recommendations for offers and models that best suit their profile in a few steps, such as a tinder of the car – in turn, Alan prefers to compare his company to another player, considering himself a kind of “trivago of cars”.

to the CEO of Compare, most current search engines have not yet updated their user experiences, limiting information that can be useful in the purchase decision. In addition, when talking about larger portals, Alan snipes: “many of these portals have left the user experience aside and have become large financing vending machines”, he says.

The comment alludes to sites like WebMotorswhich is controlled by Santander and brings the bank’s financial services; it’s the iCarswhose owner is Itau. “In the case of financing options for cars, an option that serves the public well has not yet appeared, and we want to do that”, says Marcio. “We’ve already had an insurance company, a bank looking for us to make a proposal, but it’s not our interest at the moment. Our boss is the user”, completes Alan.

Source: Startups