Investment to Transform Isolated Parking into Connected Mobility Hubs

AUSTIN, TX—Recent studies have concluded that more than 25% of traffic congestion incidences around the world can be attributed to the scarcity of parking spaces, according to TrafficTechnologyToday.com. The cloud-based parking industry is growing more rapidly with the assistance of capital partners.

In fact, today, FlashParking received a $60 million strategic investment from private equity firm L Catterton Growth Fund. The investment will be used to scale FlashParking’s cloud-based parking system that promotes the evolution of isolated parking assets into connected mobility hubs.

“We are pleased to partner with the FlashParking leadership team to accelerate the company’s growth and facilitate the delivery of mobility services to consumers and businesses,” said Michael Farello, managing partner, L Catterton Growth Fund.

Launched in 2011 as the industry’s first cloud-born parking technology, FlashParking has real-time data visibility and actionable intelligence, including supply data and dynamic pricing. Its operating system is the connective layer that transforms parking assets into multi-purpose mobility hubs where parking, transportation and logistics intersect within a smart city environment. FlashParking’s operating system allows real estate owners, parking operators and cities to tackle complex mobility issues such as congestion, lack of visibility into supply and demand, and fragmented consumer experiences.

“Over the last nine years, we have built the FlashParking platform with quality and adaptability in mind by making it cloud based, mobile first and future ready. This unique platform has allowed us to configure an operating system that’s not only the best solution for parking infrastructure today but also a model that’s ready for tomorrow,” said Juan Rodriguez, co-founder of FlashParking. “With this funding from L Catterton, we’ll be able to quickly scale our mobility hub operating system and become the only company that can turn customers’ parking assets into facilities that enable every facet of mobility, including mobile-enabled parking and valet, staging for TNCs, charging for electric vehicles, cleaning and servicing, drone launching and landing, and points for delivering.”

The mobility industry is facing a paradigm shift that is moving the conversation toward systems that can support today’s and tomorrow’s mobility services rather than typical to and from mobility technologies. To get ahead of this evolution in the coming months, FlashParking intends to announce new partnerships with transportation, logistics and mobility companies that are leveraging its platform.

“While many parking vendors are playing catch up to retrofit old solutions and cobble together cloud-based offerings, FlashParking purpose-built solutions from the ground up with a cloud-first approach,” Rodriguez tells GlobeSt.com. “We’ve essentially taken the cloud computing success seen in other industries and applied it to the parking industry to enable a better way to run parking operations and improve the bottom line. FlashParking’s cloud-based software platform, built using Microsoft Azure Cloud Services, allows clients to capitalize on a dynamic future-proof system, that will expand and support new capabilities as technology and customer demand evolves.”

FlashParking’s ability to innovate the parking experience is evident through its partnership with Texas Medical Center, the world’s largest medical city. In May 2018, the medical center chose FlashParking to help modernize its facilities and better respond to the evolving mobility ecosystem. FlashParking’s mobility platform currently controls 30,000 parking spaces via 230 lanes across 34 facilities while simplifying parking, reducing congestion, improving traffic flow and enhancing the experience for the more than 10 million patients, visitors, staff and students who visit the medical center annually.

In addition to the Texas Medical Center, FlashParking is delivering at an enterprise scale of more than 6 million parkers per month and processing $1 billion in transactions at more than 1,300 locations worldwide.

“L Catterton has an unparalleled track record of building leading brands and rapidly scaling operations, which makes them the ideal partner for us as we grow and expand our business,” Rodriguez continues. “We look forward to leveraging L Catterton’s expertise and experience scaling multi-sided marketplaces as we work together to build out connected mobile hubs that deliver value to all stakeholders.”

L Catterton has significant experience in investing in technology-enabled international marketplaces and businesses. Current and past investments include ClassPass, Artsy, Vroom, Get Your Guide and Enjoy.

BofA Securities served as financial advisor to FlashParking.