TradeMachines, a leading Meta Search Engine for used machinery, today announced a € 7-figure investment which will value the Berlin-based startup at an 8-figure valuation.
With the investment, TradeMachines will further improve the platform aiming to deliver even more value to buyers and sellers of used machinery. In addition, the young company will be expanding its activities into more industries and continue its internationalisation.
The fresh capital comes from strategic and versed angel investors and includes Dr. Albrecht von Sonntag, Marcus Seidel and Philipp Klöckner. Albrecht von Sonntag is the founder and managing director of Europe’s leading comparison search engine, Idealo, which was acquired by Axel Springer AG in 2006. Marcus Seidel is a recognized angel investor who founded several internet businesses before. Philipp Klöckner has over 10 years of online marketing experience and has previously contributed to the success of several international companies of Rocket Internet SE.
TradeMachines founder Dr. Heico Koch stated: “Striving to build the world’s best platform for used machinery, combining the experience and knowledge of Wolfgang Heigl (Founder Swoodoo, previous investor), Albrecht von Sonntag, Marcus Seidel and Philipp Klöckner will make the difference. The trust and advice of such experienced entrepreneurs will help us to pursue our vision faster and more efficiently, to accelerate growth of platform and company and to further improve our global market position.”
In addition to his role as an investor, Philipp Klöckner has joined Heico Koch and co-founder Wieland Knodel as a third Managing Director, being responsible for Marketing, Product and Business Intelligence.
TradeMachines was founded in 2013. Check out the video below this article to learn more about their busines model.
TradeMachines has so far built a superior product and a solid client base of hundreds of traders and auctioneers in the past months, but has also rapidly developed an international footprint in more than 60 targeted countries worldwide. While some 40% of TradeMachines users originate from Germany and the U.S., the other 60% of the traffic is coming from other international markets where demand for used machinery is surging, such as Central Eastern Europe, Latin America and the emerging markets in Asia and Africa.
“The demand from users in fast growing economies such as India, Pakistan, the Philippines or Nigeria on our platform has grown by 730 to 1200% year on year, depending on the country”, claims Heico Koch. He continues: “While improving our position in North America and Western Europe, we’ll continue to consequently explore more markets across the globe. Industrial equipment is a very global, yet very fragmented market. Our highly scalable international platform provides milions of interested buyers with a perfect overview, based on maximal transparency over all used machine offerings worldwide.“
