Exclusive: Cars24 Pilots Service To Allow Car Owners To Hire Drivers

Delhi NCR-based used car marketplace Cars24 is piloting a new service which allows car owners to hire drivers on-demand on an hourly basis.

The service was launched earlier this month for users in Gurugram. The DST Global-backed unicorn is aiming to launch it pan-India based on the response for its pilot programme, sources told Inc42.

As part of the pilot, Cars24 is currently offering the customers the option to hire drivers for round trip, one way, and outstation trips. 

The startup launched a separate app – Autopilot Driver – a few months ago to onboard drivers for the new service, as per the sources.

Besides verification, Cars24 also takes driving tests before onboarding the drivers, they added.

The startup would be competing with DriveU with the launch of the new service.

A questionnaire sent to Cars24 about the pilot for the new service didn’t elicit any response till the time of publishing this story. 

    Screen grab of a one-way trip in Gurugram

It is pertinent to mention that after the struggles during the Covid-19 pandemic, when Cars24 wound up operations in Indonesia and Saudi Arabia, laid off around 600 employees, and witnessed multiple high-level exits, the startup seems to have turned around its business. Last year, it launched a new vehicle scrapping initiative 

Besides, it has also seen improvement in its financials. Cars24’s consolidated net loss declined 32% year-on-year to $168.3 Mn in the financial year 2022-23 (FY23), while operating revenue jumped 16% to $930.3 Mn during the year.

Founded in 2015 by Vikram Chopra, Gajendra Jangid, Ruchit Agarwal, and Mehul Agrawal, Cars24 offers a platform for car owners to sell their used cars. It also allows users to purchase used cars via its platform and offline branches. 

Besides revenue from selling cars, it also earns from car delivery charges, parking fees, and other car-related services.  

It competes against startups like CarDekho, CarTrade, Spinny, and Droom. 

Cars24 was last valued at $3.2 Bn and has raised over a billion dollars in funding till date. The startup counts the likes of SoftBank, Alpha Wave Global, and Commercial Bank of Dubai among its investors. 

The unicorn was also looking to go public a couple of years ago but shelved its plans due to the volatility in the global equities market.

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