SAN DIEGO, Feb. 07, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Self Inspection, an AI-powered platform for the $30 billion automotive inspections market, announced today that it closed a $3 million seed round. The round was co-led by Costanoa Ventures and DVx Ventures, with participation from Westlake Financial, one of the largest financial institutions for automotive loans.
“Vehicle inspections are expensive, can take weeks to complete, and rely on outdated methods with a significant margin of error,” said Constantine Yaremtso, founder and CEO of Self Inspection. “Slow, inaccurate and expensive inspections create obstacles and a poor experience in millions of mobile transactions. Our tech completes inspections with greater speed, accuracy and customization, which can save financial institutions millions of dollars and speed up a sales process by weeks.”
Millions of cars require inspection after a car rental, to be sold after a lease return, trade or repossession, or to create an accurate condition report to accelerate a sale. If one inspection is not done correctly or at all, it can result in arbitration when a car is sold (or increased rental fees), reversing transactions and costing thousands of dollars in expenses and time.
Self Inspection provides standardized condition reports in minutes with increased real-time accuracy, a significant improvement compared to the current manual process. Key highlights from the company’s progress so far:
- Avis, the third largest rental car provider in the U.S., uses it to facilitate rental inspections and car transactions. Alaska Rent A Car, Inc. an Avis Licensee, is the first state to fully deploy it.
- CarOffer, a leading digital wholesale platform, part of CarGurus (CARG), uses Self Inspection as part of its vehicle appraisal process.
- Westlake Financial, the largest privately held finance company in the automotive industry, handles over a million vehicle transactions annually and now exclusively relies on Self Inspection to deliver condition reports to dealers during trade-ins, re-marketing and repossession processes.
Most inspections requiring an on-site visit can take days to weeks and often lack critical information like subtle defects, cost estimates, etc. Self Inspection’s AI-enhanced inspection platform quickly creates a detailed report of the entire vehicle, including exterior, interior, tires and mechanical components, with 99% accuracy based on advances in computer vision and AI models.
“We are thrilled to be partnering with the Self Inspection team to bring this product to life. Westlake Financial is already integrating Self Inspection across our business units, and have seen significant value to detect and assess issues, as well as substantial savings that we can pass to our consumers,” said Ian Anderson, president of Westlake Financial. “We need to maintain accurate records of a vehicle’s condition to ensure correct valuations, manage risk effectively, prevent fraud and determine fair prices for our customers. Self Inspection allows us to streamline and standardize our processes, ensuring accurate vehicle assessments with precise, data-backed reports at scale.”
Self Inspection is significantly more accurate than current photo-based models, which cannot effectively detect subtle defects or mechanical issues. In contrast, Self Inspection’s proprietary AI models are trained on one of the largest datasets of damaged vehicles to quickly detect and assess damage severity. This data is used to provide detailed cost estimates for repairs, resulting in one of the most thorough vehicle inspection reports available in the industry.
“We are excited to support the Self Inspection team in their mission to transform the vehicle inspection industry through AI. The traditional vehicle inspection process is ripe for innovation, and Self Inspection’s solution addresses a critical need by providing accurate, efficient and scalable inspections,” said Karim Bousta, partner at DVx Ventures and automotive industry expert. “This technology not only streamlines operations for auto lenders, dealerships and rental companies but also sets a new benchmark for quality, reliability and a seamless digital experience in the $30 billion vehicle inspection market.”
“Innovation that can modernize a massive traditional industry, like automotive, and solve a critical need through AI is poised for long-term growth,” said Greg Sands, managing partner at Costanoa Ventures. “Self Inspection built a reliable AI-powered vehicle inspection platform that ensures data-backed trust every time a vehicle changes hands. This will prove radically useful as the industry evolves.”
Yaremtso, a Ukrainian immigrant, founded the company in 2021 with former leaders from Apple, NVIDIA and Coinbase who bring significant AI and automotive experience. Self Inspection plans to use the funds to expand its engineering team in both Ukraine and the U.S. to accelerate product development and enhance machine learning algorithms to optimize and expand use cases.
For more information and to keep up with the latest news from Self Inspection and its traction in the automotive industry, visit https://www.selfinspection.com/.
About Self Inspection
Headquartered in San Diego, Self Inspection was founded in 2021 and is an AI-powered solution in the automotive industry dedicated to revolutionizing the $30 billion vehicle inspection industry. The platform leverages cutting-edge AI technology to deliver unparalleled accuracy and efficiency in vehicle inspections to cut costs and save time through automated, self-guided inspections. Founded by industry veterans with extensive experience in AI, software development and the automotive industry, the company is backed by Costanoa Ventures, DVx Ventures and Westlake Financial. For more information, visit https://www.selfinspection.com/.
A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/9fd9346e-be1c-46e1-9c70-bb2c00af106b
