Home services startups are gaining attention
Investors have been pouring money into upstart companies aiming to help home owners with maintaining and upgrading their properties.
In the past year, at least US$1.4 billion went to such home services startups according to Crunchbase analysis. Some are directly serving retail customers, some provide products to support contractors.
In one of the largest deals, ServiceTitan, which creates software for contractors in plumbing, electrical and other special areas to generate leads and close sales, closed a US$500 million round last month. The firm has raised over US$1 billion so far.
Other transactions include US275 million raised by Thumbtack, an app for finding and hiring local professionals, US$50 million raised by subscription plans provider Super and US$90 million raised by HomeX, which offers virtual support for home repair troubleshooting.
Home services market is estimated to be worth US$500 billion as homes are regularly in need of care and repair and few have the tools and skills to do it on their own.
Though not in the business of cutting-edge technology involving some of the hottest areas like big data, AI, IoT and 5G, many of these home services startups do have a technology spin in their solution offerings to provide something better, cheaper or something different from traditional players.
-- Contact us at [email protected]
-
How to well spend the HK$300 million allocated to art tech? Dr. Winnie Tang
Local movie director Chu Yuan passed away earlier. In a lament, film critic Ka Ming recalled Chu's five masterpieces in the 1960s and 1970s. In his remark, Ka criticised that like most old Hong Kong
-
A cross-border ‘yellow cow’ story Ben Kwok
Almost all overseas fellows of my age that I know came to Hong Kong during the pandemic only for one reason: to meet their parents as much as possible. But in order to see their parents in person,
-
Advancing responsible business conduct Hanscom Smith
We need only look at the front-page news to see that companies are reassessing their business practices in areas ranging from preventing and addressing forced labor in their supply chains,
-
Re-opening Hong Kong a must Brian YS Wong
Hong Kong’s value to its country remains its openness, cosmopolitanism, and fundamental willingness to embrace and take on the unknown. It is its internationalism, as opposed to inward-looking
-
No health without mental health Dr. Winnie Tang
The universities in Australia made a bold move last year， lowering the tuition fees by 42% in five subjects, including two medical-related subjects, nursing and clinical psychology. According to the
