Buildzar raises $4 million from Puneet Dalmia

CEO says vision is to give consumer the power to manage construction using only his/her mobile phone

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Home construction and renovation marketplace Buildzar has raised $4 million (Rs 27.22 crore) from Dalmia Cement Bharat Managing Director Puneet Dalmia in pre-Series A funding.

"The fact that the new age customer is younger, internet-savvy, and is willing to pay for standardisation and quality, makes this business even more exciting," Buildzar co-founder, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Managing Director (MD) Vineet Singh said.

"Our vision is to give consumer the power to manage a complex thing like construction, using only his/her mobile phone," he added.

Buildzar offers a comprehensive bouquet of products and services under two verticals -- The Material Store and BuildMyHome.

The Material Store is a marketplace having over 20,000 products related to civil, electrical, plumbing, paints, flooring, kitchen and bathroom materials, while BuildMyHome is a curated platform for design and contracting services with over 70 contractors and architects.

While its current focus is on consolidating business in the Delhi-National Capital Region (NCR), which alone is valued at $9-10 billion, in the next six months, Buildzar aims to expand across southern markets, starting with Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad.

The first innovation at Buildzar was their estimation tool, Beztimate, which solves the foremost problem of the consumer -- clarity on construction cost, time, and quantity of material, which Beztimate provides in one click. Buildzar came up with several other innovations in its Material Store, offerings like organising the entire store by budget, bundling of products according to the construction stage into 'Combos', and selling the entire bill of materials (BOM) rather than selling individual stock-keeping units.

In the recently-launched BuildMyHome, Buildzar offers hassle-free building and renovation experience to the consumer by providing end-to-end design, supply and build solutions through qualified and professional service providers, standardised rates and service-level agreements (SLAs), guaranteed-adherence to project cost and timelines, and warranties up to seven years. The team is developing project management tool, through which a home builder can monitor all her construction-related metrics like cost-incurred, projected completion timelines, inventory, etc, on a real-time basis and can also receive live feeds, alerts and updates on his project.

Talking about the venture, Vineet Singh, co-founder, CEO & MD, buildzar.com said, "Building a home is perhaps the longest and highest value transaction in an individual's lifetime. The fact that the new-age customer is younger, internet-savvy and is willing to pay for standardisation and quality, makes this business even more exciting for us. Our vision is to give consumer the power to manage a complex thing like construction, using only their mobile phone.