Kenyan Automotive Marketplace Peach Cars Raises USD 5 M Seed Funding

Kenyan automotive marketplace Peach Cars is announcing its USD 5 M seed round led by Japan-based The University of Tokyo Edge Capital Partners (UTEC) and other angel investors, including Shintaro Yamada (founder and CEO of Mercari), Peter Kenevan (VP, Head of Japan at PayPal), and Hiroaki Ohta (general partner at Japan’s Waseda University Ventures). The startup plans to use the money to grow the business, hire more talent and double down on R&D as it expands its tech solutions.

Founded in 2020 to democratize car ownership in sub-Saharan Africa, Peach Cars claims to have developed a smart engine check device that utilizes its proprietary-built software to automate its car inspection process. Peach leverages its inspection methods and information for the better diagnosis of the vehicles and the quality assurance of the fixes made on vehicles. The car marketplace collects service fees and commissions on successful transactions between sellers and buyers. It gets additional revenue streams from providing value-add services, including administrative work for transactions on agreements, inspections, change of ownerships, secured payment and handovers.