Auto1 Group, a Germany-based online car dealer backed by telecommunications and internet group SoftBank’s Vision Fund, has completed a €255m ($300m) convertible note round.
Investment firm Farallon Capital Management and hedge fund Baupost Group co-led the round, which also featured unnamed existing shareholders.
Formerly known as PKW1, Auto1 operates several e-commerce brands including Auto1.com and Autohero that facilitate purchases and sales of vehicles between private and corporate customers.
The company said it increased revenue by more than 20% to about $3.9bn in 2019 and has so far overseen the trading of some 2 million vehicles. It recently began building its own delivery trucks and will put the latest financing into company growth.
Vision Fund made a $565m primary and secondary investment in the company in early 2018 at a $3.56bn valuation to reportedly increase the company’s overall financing to $1.1bn.
Mutschler Ventures, the venture capital arm of real estate developer Mutschler Group, had joined DST Global, Cherry Ventures and Piton Capital to invest $200m in Auto1 in 2016, before investors including Princeville Global, Target Global and Baillie Gifford supplied $404m in debt and equity financing the following year.
Markus Boser, chief financial officer of Auto1, said: “We are grateful for the trust that our new and existing partners are placing in us as we continue to build our vision of creating Europe’s most advanced digital automotive platform.
“We have achieved tremendous success since we founded Auto1 Group in 2012 in our traditional [consumer-to-business sales] business and are now ready to take our business to the next level.”
