CallFixie helps Hong Kongers and Aussies repair households on-demand

As on-demand service startups continue to grow in the United States, it’s no surprise when analogous firms emerge in Asia. One of those firms is CallFixie, which connects tradesmen looking for jobs with homeowners looking to get stuff repaired.

Through an Android or iOS app, CallFixie users can specify the type of fix they’re looking for (plumbing, electric), enter in a description and photo of the issue, and request a tradesmen. Upon spotting the submission, interested repairmen can respond with a quote. The service recalls Handy, the New York City-based startup that’s raised US$45 million to date, as well as Homejoy, the San Francisco-based startup that’s raised US$40 million to date (though that company only offers home cleaning).

CallFixie is part of Jaarwis, the Hong Kong-based venture group that incubates handpicked startups through a Rocket Internet-esque model. While CallFixie has been in gestation since its inception in March, it officially launched in Australia in December, followed by Hong Kong in January. Co-founders Gabriel Fong and Jaspal Sarai, both of whom double as Jaarwis’ founders (Fong also once served as chairman at Gogovan), recently closed a US$1 million seed round for the company from individual investors.

Sarai says that a disparity exists between Australia and Hong Kong’s respect market for trade services, as the former is tightly regulated while the latter remains somewhat fly-by-night. As a result, he believes CallFixie’s value add will manifest itself differently in the two places.

“The trades people in Australia are essentially small businesses who are earning anything from AU$100,000 to AU$120,000 (about US$77,000 to US$93,000) [annually]. So the ecosystem is already established in the sense that they value their time. If they’re driving around giving quotes for five jobs and only get two jobs out of it, then that’s a huge waste of time for them,” says Sarai.

“In Hong Kong, the trades people themselves are generally not well off. So they want to maximize the number of jobs they can do in a day” he adds. “We’ve already seen in Hong Kong that once you put a job up, you’ll get a quote within two minutes.”

Tradesmen that sign up to join Callfixie send out their own quotes and are rated by customers after a job is finished. CallFixie intends to monetize by taking a ten percent commission from tradesmen based off of the quote. The company has already begun charging in Australia, and is currently offering its services for free in Hong Kong. Since credit card ownership among Hong Kong’s tradesmen likely remains low, Sarai says the company will simply monthly bills they can pay in cash.

“Since CallFixie is a  platform that provides you jobs very month, I’m sure [tradesmen] would like to stay on that platform,” says Sarai.

If CallFixie continues to expand into other parts of Asia, one potential competitor could be Kaodim, a Malaysia-based service booking startup. In February, that company closed a US$500,000 seed round led by East Ventures. While the company has expressed an interest in moving outside of Malaysia, it’s different from CallFixie because it offers a wider range of bookable service professionals, like photographers and yoga instructors.

In the United States, the household service startup space has seen consolidation over the past two years. Last year, HomeJoy acquired New York City’s GetMaid, while Handy purchased San Francisco’s Exec and Lonon’s Mopp. If startups like CallFixie and Kaodim, and others see meaningful traction in Asia, expect to see similar patterns of funding and consolidation.