CarWoo!, New Service to Transform Car Buying, Closes Series A Funding

BURLINGAME, Calif. and LAS VEGAS, Oct. 13 /PRNewswire/ -- CarWoo! (www.carwoo.com), a new service which will transform the way consumers buy cars, launching today at Digital Dealer and BlogWorld Expo, announces the closure of its Series A financing.  Total funding received to date exceeds $6M.

The round was led by Interwest Partners with participation by Comcast Interactive Capital, Blumberg Capital, Accelerator Ventures, Raymond Tonsing and Dillon McDonald.  Previously the company had obtained seed financing upon completion of the Y Combinator program in late 2009.  The seed financing was led by Comcast Interactive Capital with participation from Blumberg Capital, Accelerator Ventures and a number of angels and prominent individuals, including: Paul Buchheit - Early Google employee, created Gmail, founded Friendfeed; Joshua Schachter - Founder of Del.icio.us; Aydin Senkut - Felicis Ventures; Founders Fund Angel - Dave McClure.

"Seeing CarWoo! grow from what we knew was a good idea to being a thriving and expanding enterprise assisting over 3,000 dealers nationwide and thousands of buyers per month in the car buying and selling process, while not unexpected given our offering, has nonetheless been exciting," says co-Founder and CEO Tommy McClung.

CarWoo! is the first online service that allows buyers to receive firm offers on new cars anonymously from multiple competing dealers, ensuring the best possible offer on the car they want to buy.  The first of its kind nationwide, new car buying marketplace, CarWoo! enables consumers to interact with multiple dealers online, get their best offers without needing to haggle with dealerships on-site, or to make endless phone calls to find a dealer with the car they want at the price they're willing to pay.

Erik Landerholm, co-Founder and CTO added, "Emerging from stealth operations with our launch and with this funding allows CarWoo! to really begin serving a community of 12 million new car buyers a year and 20,000 new car dealers while we continue to enhance and expand the CarWoo! service."

With veteran industry advisors and board directors that include Rob Chesney, former VP/GM of eBay Motors, Dillon McDonald, former COO of Jumpstart Automotive, Tom Taira, CEO and founder of Honk.com and co-founder of Zag and TrueCar, Jeff Fluhr, founder and former CEO of StubHub, Tim Weaver, Vice President of Sales for ResponseLogix,  Niall Hay, E-Commerce Director for a major automotive group, and Michael Yang, former VP/GM of Yahoo! Autos, CarWoo! is well positioned to revolutionize the new car buying process.  

"In CarWoo!, we see an innovative company that is effectively addressing a critical need for a very large market," said Doug Pepper, General Partner at Interwest.  "We are excited that this financing will accelerate the rapid growth already being executed at CarWoo!"

While other internet services and properties have served to make large markets such as travel more efficient, the very large automotive industry has been a laggard in this area.  CarWoo! was created to bring internet efficiencies to the car buying and selling process.

"Over 80% of consumers use the Internet to help them with their new car shopping process and there is no shortage of auto-related information online.  However, most third party automotive sites have failed to help the consumer during the negotiation process.  CarWoo! brings this missing component to the puzzle which is why Vehix is excited to be their partner," said Derek Mattsson, CEO Vehix.com.

Available Immediately:

Consumers have the option of two plans with which to negotiate anonymously with dealers with availability today at http://www.carwoo.com and coming soon to its online partners. CarWoo! executives will be available at Digital Dealer, BlogWorld Expo, and J. D. Power and Associates Automotive Internet Roundtable.

About CarWoo!

CarWoo!, simply the best way to buy a new car, was founded in 2009 by serial entrepreneurs, Tommy McClung, Erik Landerholm and Michael Young. It is the first online service that allows buyers to negotiate anonymously with multiple dealers, ensuring the best offers on the car they want.  With early funding by Y Combinator, CarWoo! is based in Burlingame, CA and is now funded by Blumberg Capital, Comcast Interactive Capital, and Interwest Partners.  Find us on Facebook at www.facebook.com and on Twitter at twitter.com/carwoo.

SOURCE CarWoo!