100X.VC-backed honc, a Car Wash at Doorstep Company, Raises US $400,000 in Pre-seed Round. The funding is testament to the investor’s confidence in the rising demand for a doorstep car wash solution, which currently has an annual spend of US $12 billion in India
Hyderabad, March 14, 2022: honc, a tech-first company for car washes at the doorstep, has raised US $400,000 in a pre-seed round, led by Amey Mashelkar (Head of JioGenNext), Jasminder Singh Gulati (Co-founder at NowFloats), Dholakia Ventures, Dr. Raghunath A Mashelkar (Independent Director at RIL), Nilesh Patel (Leadership team, Cisco systems) and 100X.VC.
The startup, which is a 100X.VC portfolio company and part of the Class 06 batch, plans to utilise the fresh funds to expand its partner network across Hyderabad, Bengaluru and Gurugram in the next 12 months. honc plans to upgrade its tech stack to scale across gated communities and business parks using location intelligence and user review systems. The company will further deploy the capital to supercharge onboarding, training and safety of the partners on the platform.
“While car wash in India has an annual spend of $12 billion, it’s still in the early stages of its digital transformation. The fund infusion is a testament to investor’s confidence in the rising demand for a doorstep solution. In the last year, we were able to add over 200 partners to our network. We carry out 4,000 car washes per day in Hyderabad alone. We aim to make the traditional car wash industry efficient, environmentally friendly and a customer-centric one”, said Niranjan Seelam, Co-founder & CEO, honc.
With the increasing demand for honc’s doorstep services, the startup is also expanding its services to reach a wider audience segment at business parks. honc has already signed agreements with corporate/IT parks across three cities in India recently, in line with its expansion plans.
Rahul Marwar, Co-founder & Director of Sales, honc said, “With our technology and process interventions, we simplified the onboarding and training processes for our partners. We are also introducing women into the wash segment across business parks. We believe this will untap the large blue collar workforce segment.”
The company enabled its partners to increase their monthly income by 100% in the last six months. Furthermore, honc’s eco-friendly washes has helped save nearly 1,50,000 litres of water every month across gated communities.
“We all struggle to keep our cars clean every day. The existing options are broken, leaving car owners dissatisfied with bitter experiences. With its tech-first approach, honc made it efficient and simplified the whole process of keeping our cars clean. Car wash being the everyday touch point in the car owner’s mind, we believe honc is well poised to play a bigger role in scaling to other services as well,” said Ninad Karpe, Partner at 100X.VC.
“Today’s fundraise reflects the strength of honc’s business model, execution capabilities and the incredible opportunity ahead. The past year steered in a new normal, changing people’s perspective of car wash at the doorstep. After understanding our consumer behaviour we tend to bring in many customised updates to our app. Our mission is to deliver car services to every doorstep in India,” said Viraji, Co-founder & Product Owner, honc.
Founded in 2020, honc is playing an important role in India’s car wash industry—which is largely unorganised and underserved—with its managed marketplace model. The company provides an on-demand, mobile-first doorstep solution that caters to the spontaneous needs of car owners with a curated selection of trusted and reliable partners.
