Buenos Aires-based IguanaFix, a home-services startup, is an on-demand home improvement marketplace and service provider. It contracts plumbers, electricians, painters or other professionals for required jobs to carry out home repairs. It helps connect them with consumers and retail stores, thereby providing B2C services to end-customers and B2C solutions to major retailers in the markets where it operates.
The firm closed a $16 million series B round on Monday, receiving investment from Singapore sovereign fund Temasek Holdings and Qualcomm Ventures, the investment arm of telecommunications company Qualcomm. The new financing round will help fuel its expansion beyond its base, in particular in Brazil and Mexico, said a report in New York Times. Existing investor RCV Capital, a vehicle maintained by private equity firm Riverwood Capital for partners, also participated in the round.
Temasek has fueled half of the capital, $8 million, into IguanaFix which is very unusual. It hasn’t shown major interest in Latin America, considering it has invested only 2 percent of its roughly $168 billion portfolio. On the other hand, Qualcomm has been actively investing in the region. Carlos Kokron, vice president and managing director for Latin America for Qualcomm Ventures, states they have closed five new investments and four follow-on ones this year compared to three new investments and three follow-on ones in 2015.
Qualcomm Ventures has financed 16 companies in Latin America, almost all based in Brazil. Its global portfolio comprises more than 140 companies. Carlos said, despite the mess in Brazil, the tech start-up industry is progressing at a good pace. It had got in touch with IguanaFix more than two years, but they shared distinct visions. IguanaFix was concentrating on Argentina, and Qualcomm Ventures, whose Latin America office is based in São Paulo, Brazil, were looking for startups based in that country. This year, however, QV decided it is time to be proactive and push its horizons beyond Brazil.
IguanaFix is now all set to expand in the region. Though seventy percent of its revenue comes from Argentina, Recchia expects it to decline by about 30 percent by the end of 2017.
