Faircado receives 3 million euros funding boost from World Fund

Faircado, the AI-powered second-hand shopping assistant, has closed a 3 million euros pre-seed funding round led by World Fund, European Climate Tech VC Fund. The round also involved an investment from Accel, General Catalyst, Lightspeed Venture Partners, NEA, and Northzone.

With a flurry of recent investment for Faircado, the round combines 1 million euros from World Fund, 1 million euros from Slush VC’s, and 150 thousand euros from Impact Shakers. The company said in a release that a total 3 million euros figure includes an initial investment of 750 thousand euros from BackBone Ventures, Earlybird and Minc accelerators as well as Peak Capital and Atomico’s angels, among others in November 2022.

“World Fund is an ideal partner for Faircado. Their expertise, expansive network and commitment to climate tech that bolsters a regenerative world will be instrumental as we scale our product. With this latest funding, we aim to make sustainable choices more accessible and mainstream for millions of consumers,” said the company’s co-founder and CEO Evoléna de Wilde d‘Estmael.

The company added that the fresh capital will fuel team expansion, geographical growth into UK and French markets, and further development of its image recognition technology.

Founded in 2022 by Evoléna de Wilde d’Estmael and Ali Nezamolmaleki, the Berlin-based startup offers an AI-powered browser extension that helps consumers automatically find second-hand alternatives when shopping online, drawing from a database of over 60 million products from 50 different partners including eBay, Back Market, Grailed, Rebuy and Vestiaire Collective.

The company added that using advanced AI, Faircado's in-house image-matching algorithms gather key information including product images, titles and brands to provide users with tailored resale recommendations. Employing both a revenue-per-click and a commission-based model, Faircado earns a percentage commission on sales generated through its platform to partner sites, and charges a fixed fee for each user redirected to these platforms.

“Our society buys too much stuff, while our basements, bookshelves and closets are full of exactly the stuff other people want. At the same time, we tend to forget about this fact, which is why I love when Faircado automatically tells me while shopping on Amazon for example that ‘wait a minute, here’s the same stuff used, in great condition, yet 80 percent cheaper’,” added Tim Schumacher, general partner at World Fund.