Carputty Announces $12.3M Series A Funding to Modernize Auto Financing

Staff Report

Thursday, December 8th, 2022

Carputty, a fintech company modernizing both auto financing and ownership, today announced the closing of a $12.3 million Series A funding round. This raise, co-led by Fontinalis Partners and TTV Capital, brings Carputty's total funding amount to $21.96 million. Additional investors include Porsche Ventures and Grand Ventures, as well as Kickstart Fund, who led the Company’s seed round.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, American families own an average of 2.5 vehicles, often representing the second most valuable asset in any given household. Despite this, the majority of consumers are ill-informed and ill-prepared when making financial decisions regarding their automobiles. More than 60% of auto loans originate at the dealership, where rates rarely take the buyers’ financial standing into account. Recent FTC reports have revealed that many of the same issues that plagued the home mortgage industry in the run-up to the 2008 crisis are present in the auto financing space today.

“We created Carputty to bring transparency to auto financing and empower car owners to make more informed decisions about their vehicles, just like they would with their other investments,” said Patrick Bayliss, co-founder and CEO. “We are proud to be supported by investment teams with deep experience in automotive and fintech, and thrilled that they embrace our vision.”

With the Carputty Flexline™, consumers and businesses get flexible lines of credit that can be used to finance any vehicle. Flexline accounts have a maximum of $250,000 and can be used to purchase new or used vehicles directly and can also be used to buyout leases or refinance existing auto loans. Once established, members always have financing in place for as long as they want or need it, powered by the Company’s end-to-end data-driven platform.

“While it’s critical to deliver a great experience for our members, we built our software with an equally robust feature-set to support and scale with Carputty’s ever-expanding network of partners,” said Joshua Tatum, co-founder and Chief Product Officer. “The platform can be embedded seamlessly with a broad variety of businesses who could benefit from our end-to-end capabilities – from point-of-sale all the way through to servicing.”

“Unlike student loans or mortgages, where the consumer experience has undergone significant innovation in recent years, traditional auto-financing remains cumbersome, opaque and expensive. Carputty stands to change that, and it’s building a fundamentally new consumer solution for an automotive market that has $1.5 trillion in outstanding loans and 276 million registered cars,” said Chris Cheever, Founder and Partner at Fontinalis Partners. “We are incredibly excited to support Patrick, Joshua and the entire team as they revolutionize the complete lifecycle of automotive asset management.”

“The auto finance market is overdue for broad innovation. Patrick, Joshua and the Carputty team impressed us with their vision to bring transparency and accessibility to the car buying process,” said Sean Banks, Partner at TTV Capital. “Carputty’s platform is unique in its ability to simplify car ownership through digitally managed payments and services. We see a massive opportunity for Carputty to re-engineer the auto finance market by providing a flexible line of credit that is based on the consumer’s financial standing, not the value of the transaction.”

Over the past year, the Company has seen an 850% increase in members resulting in more than 14,000 members to date, a 3100% increase in Flexline dollars approved, and a 1200% growth in individual loans. The new capital will be used to drive further growth through accelerated platform development, expanded business collaborations with both existing and future partners, and expedited commercialization and adoption throughout the U.S.