Buying and servicing a vehicle has never been easier. From registration to insurance and even selling an auto has been transformed by digital solutions. Or has it?
There is still huge room for improvement in streamlining the approach to relationships in the auto sales, auto repair, auto insurance and auto finance industries.
So step forward, CarFix, issuer of the Vehicle Lifecycle Blockchain (VLB) token, a company that wants to reshape the $1.8 trillion vehicle lifecycle industry by integrating blockchain technology.
In the company’s words, it wants to ‘change the face of one of the most obsolete industries in the world’.
The company has announced its ICO for the VLB token on 27th November and follows a slew of industries this year that have eschewed VC money, crowdfunding or an IPO to raise money.
The VLB hopes to usher many vehicle lifecycle industry players such as vehicle manufacturers, dealers, repair shops, insurance companies, spare parts distributors and others into a new 'era'.
Carfix wants to streamline repair costs through the blockchain.
CarfixProceeds from the ICO will be used to develop and implement a blockchain platform for the vehicle lifecycle industry to bring transparency and immutability to everything that happens to a car from the moment it comes off the factory floor until the time it is recycled in the junkyard.
The company’s strategy is to use this blockchain to make a regular maintenance job experience purged of oppressive bureaucracy and create trust among repair shop owners; a common disconnect caused by limited knowledge of the average consumer about his car.
The car repair industry is typically riddled with faulty and unnecessary costs. When customers use the VLB token for auto repairs all these fees will be avoided.
CarFix says it has created a transactional software platform and an ecosystem of repair shops, spare parts suppliers and dealers where any repair job is instantly priced via a transparent algorithm and can be booked in much the same way as hotel rooms are reserved.
After 18 months since launch, CarFix has implemented a software that establishes fixed prices for all vehicle repairs. Its ecosystem currently encompasses more than 500 repair shops, 10 of the largest spare parts distributors, major dealerships and more than 250,000 users of which 50,000 are regular paying customers.
This ecosystem is apparently still growing and will be further empowered by the blockchain’s core premises of decentralization and immutability of records. In essence, the VLB token is bringing trust to a once-thought ‘trustless; industry.
CarFix’s Ethereum-based platform provides many benefits to users including enforcing warranties, maximizing the resale value of vehicles, ascertaining the authenticity of spare parts and more accurate and cost-effective insurance claim management.
“VLB streamlines one of the most antiquated industries in the world when it comes to customer services and transparency. We will develop and deploy it within our expanded ecosystem and beyond in a decentralized manner with a distributed network of proof-of-stake nodes.
“We strongly believe that our blockchain technology can tap into the $1.8 trillion vehicle lifecycle industry to provide consumers with a positive experience and create significant business and cost saving opportunities for industry players,” said Oskar Hartmann, Co-Founder and President of VLB.
CarFix’s team of advisors, include Sergey Solonin, founder and CEO of QIWI, Alexey Arkhipov, CTO of QIWI and the developer behind MasterChain and Hannes Chopra, former Senior VP of Allianz Insurance Company.
