Carsome Group Announces Acquisition of Majority Stake in CarTimes Automobile
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia & Singapore, 17 March, 2022 - Southeast Asia’s largest integrated car e-commerce platform Carsome Group Pte Ltd (Carsome), today announced the acquisition of 51% stake in CarTimes Automobile Pte Ltd (CarTimes).
Established in 2001, CarTimes is one of the largest and trusted, award-winning auto companies in Singapore, which offers a full suite of auto solutions ranging from new and used car retail, rental, financing, insurance to repair, maintenance and workshops. In alignment with Carsome’s mission of prioritizing customers’ values, CarTimes built its business to ensure every customer can enjoy ultimate peace of mind at every step of the car transaction and ownership journey.
Carsome Co-founder and Group CEO Eric Cheng mentioned that CarTimes has built a strong brand in Singapore, trusted by local customers and partners since 2001, through a seamless car transaction process supported through a broad range of ancillary services such as financing and insurance. “We are thrilled to announce the partnership with CarTimes, the team of which has over twenty years of experience in the auto industry. This partnership will enable us to deepen our footprint in the Singapore auto market, and augment our ability in bringing trust, choice and transparency to customers together,” Cheng said.
CarTimes Founder and Managing Director Eddie Loo mentioned that the partnership with Carsome is crucial in assisting them to better serve customers and to provide them with the resources to digitize and improve the two-decade-old relationship that they have with their customers. “We are extremely excited to be able to find a partner who is fully aligned with our core values and is bringing innovation, technology, and regional experience to our team. Having built an automotive ecosystem of services for our customers here in Singapore, we believe that we have managed to convey our vision of providing a peace-of-mind buying experience to our customers,” Loo added.
The acquisition is an important move that further strengthens Carsome’s market leadership in the region, and reinforces Carsome’s commitment to drive ecosystem expansion. It comes after the company’s recent announcement of completing its acquisition of iCar Asia, a leading listing and content automotive platform in Southeast Asia, and the appointment of Digbijoy Shukla as Head of Merger and Acquisition and Ecosystem Strategy.
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