How CarDekho navigated Carro, Carsome to find space in SEA

After India-based CarDekho’s Southeast Asia business unit secured a US$60 million funding round in December 2024, it may have seemed like competition among used-car marketplaces in the region such as Singapore’s Carro and Malaysia’s Carsome intensified.

However, this wasn’t quite the case.

CarDekho SEA co-founder and CEO Umang Kumar/ Photo credit: CarDekho SEA

Unlike Carro and Carsome, which focus on used-car sales, the majority of Singapore-registered CarDekho SEA’s revenue comes from being a finance aggregator for used-car dealerships. It earns an 8% to 10% commission on each loan enabled on the platform. It made over US$40 million in revenue for 2024, according to a source.

CarDekho SEA is now eyeing profitability by 2026, co-founder and CEO Umang Kumar tells Tech in Asia.

The company, whose India entity is en route to an IPO this year, will use its freshly raised funds to make further inroads into Indonesia and the Philippines – its existing markets in Southeast Asia – via acquisitions and its insurance business. CarDekho also plans to enter one new country every year starting 2025.

However, Indian startups in the automobile space have struggled to get a foothold in the region. Used-car marketplace Cars24 pulled back from Indonesia in 2023, just a year after its entry, and then exited Thailand in April 2024. Zoomcar, the Nasdaq-listed car rental firm, left Vietnam in May 2023, just two years after it planned to invest US$100 million into Southeast Asia.

So how did CarDekho find the road to profitability in the region?

Complementing Carro and Carsome

A strategy that has worked in CarDekho’s favor is its complementary business model.

When the company entered Southeast Asia, it steered clear of becoming a dealer in the used-car space, which was already a highly competitive sector with players like Carro, Carsome, and OLX.

Carro team / Photo credit: Carro

In fact, CarDekho is a partner for Carro and Carsome. According to Carro co-founder Aaron Tan, its financing business can be availed at CarDekho’s marketplace, which will continue to be available “as much as practicable.”

While Carro and Carsome also provide auto loans through their own partner financiers, smaller dealers – those that sell around five to 10 cars a month – prefer availing the service through CarDekho. Kumar points out that such dealers directly compete with Carro and Carsome, so they are unlikely to approach the two used-car marketplaces for financing services due to concerns of losing their customers to them.

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