A chat with Instacar: reinventing the car ownership experience in Greece

Time flies, and we couldn’t be happier to have spent the past two years collaborating with one of the most talented teams in Greece, Instacar!

Vassilis Damianos, Antonis Samothrakis and Antonis Zois decided to combine their years of experience and started their journey with the idea of building Greece’s first fully digitized car-as-a-service company to address the flexible needs of businesses and individuals.

Car ownership has become unnecessarily rigid and unconventional. Most likely, we have all experienced the hurdles and inconvenience underlying either the purchasing or leasing of a car, ranging from high capital investments to bureaucratic processes. The most evident solution became the startup’s mission, and today Instacar operates a fleet of over 600 vehicles and serves hundreds of customers nationwide, offering convenience, digitization, and flexibility.

We asked co-founder Antonis Samothrakis to share with us some of the key highlights from his journey so far and his vision for the future.

• What were the great milestones achieved by Instacar since your launch?

During the past two years we’ve managed to build a business of a current ARR of +€3M with an initial investment of €300k of equity and we overcame in no time the “valley of death” point. We managed to build strong industry relations with car and financing suppliers. Thus we built a fleet of 600 cars having customers all over Greece. Also, it is notable that we spent less than €90k for marketing, which shows the tremendous product-market fit of Instacar.

• Instacar offers an end-to-end platform that enables flexible leasing for businesses and individuals. What trends did you witness during the challenging pandemic period and what opportunities arose for your business?

At this stage, a large number of SMEs and consumers will not commit funds for the acquisition of cars or for inflexible long-term leasing contracts. On the other hand, using our service, a consumer or an enterprise can lease a vehicle for as long as they want and change it whenever they want. Also, the increase in e-commerce orders was an opportunity for us to grow our fleet by supplying SMEs with minivans for last-mile/courier services.

• What have been the key learnings from your experience as a founder so far and which advice would you give to new entrepreneurs starting off their journey?

My last experience was in a food delivery marketplace in Iran, which has grown extremely fast from 2017 to 2018. Then the US sanctions came in, so for 2 more years I managed to keep the business alive under tough market conditions. After that, being a founder in Greece/Europe looks like a voyage in calm seas for me.

Being a founder is a pleasure, but then again you have to navigate through uncharted seas and be ready to explore and surpass a mountain of obstacles. Unfortunately, it’s not for everyone. You have to be patient, calm, and believe in yourself, your team, and your service till the end.

I am always following the rule of “done is better than perfect” and I learned that perfection is not easily achieved in tandem with the fast growth of an early-stage company.

• What are the next goals for Instacar?

As we are a capital/asset intensive business model, looking for new sources of financing and vehicles suppliers is part of our daily routine. In the short term, our next goals are to add further types of vehicles in our platform, enhance customer experience and improve our technology.

On top of that, we are exploring new potential markets for expansion in the Balkans and MENA region and our long term vision during the next 3 years is to transform instacar into a mobility super-app aiming to connect drivers/riders with suppliers and any tap into new possibilities around mobility.

• How would you describe a successful relationship between startups and VCs?

In my opinion, both sides have to follow three core values: respect, understanding and support. Also I think that both sides should have a common vision and contribute as much as they can to accomplish it. Unfortunately, founders need to understand that VC’s are managing funds of investors and their goal is to return profits, and you can’t be their only spot of attention. I feel lucky that Velocity.Partners is inline with my values and we both work towards the same vision, to “make every vehicle wanna-be an insta-vehicle”!

About Velocity.Partners

Velocity.Partners is an industry-agnostic Venture Capital fund. Our mission is to fuel Greek entrepreneurs around the globe to build world-class technology companies.

We invest in pre-Seed & Seed stages, typically up to €500K, and follow up next rounds, helping our companies build their team, prove product-market fit, gain market traction and get ready for big-league VCs along the way.

Our portfolio gets instant access to a global network of industry experts, international investors and potential clients. We also offer lifelong operational support, strategic advice and mentoring as needed.

Velocity.Partners is part of the EquiFund family of venture capital funds and is also supported by the Operational Program “Competitiveness, Entrepreneurship & Innovation” (EPAnEK).