Gavl, a groundbreaking digital start-up offering a first-to-market technology, has recently secured $1.8 million in Series A funding from Harris Capital, the investment office of Flight Centre founder, Geoff Harris. The company, launched in December 2016, leads the world in live-streamed auctions and has already enabled 200 Australian real estate agencies to broadcast 3,500 auctions, resulting in 2.5 million views. With downloads in 44 countries, Gavl is considered the most thrilling app in real estate.
Co-founded by Joel Smith, an ex-AFL player turned businessman, Leith Donaldson and Michael Artup, Gavl was initially launched with $300,000, contributed by Joel and his father-in-law. A $2.5 million investment from Harris Capital in June 2016 allowed Gavl to live stream its first auction and release its iOS and Android apps.
What implications does this funding have for Gavl?
Gavl is set to raise an additional $4.2 million, which will complete the $6 million Series A funding round, initiated by the injection of $1.8 million from Harris Capital. The added funds will facilitate the introduction of live auction bidding, enabling property buyers to view and bid in real-time from any location globally, with support for eight major currencies.
Joel Smith, the CEO of Gavl, explains that the platform is currently testing technology that allows customers to bid, buy and complete auction transactions remotely without being present at the auction site. The enhanced functionality will expand the options available to bidders and provide vendors with a more extensive audience to increase sales opportunities. Smith states that the funding will close the loop of remote auction participation, revolutionizing the traditional auction process.
Gavl has already established itself as the leader in live streaming auction technology worldwide. The app was the first of its kind and has experienced significant growth in just a few months. It is the only platform exclusively dedicated to the real estate industry, with patented technology that enables live event broadcasting with only a one-second delay – superior to Facebook Live, commonly used in the industry.
Joel notes that when the team tested Facebook Live for auction live streaming, they measured a latency of 5-20 seconds. In an auction environment, this delay could mean the difference between a property selling for $950,000 and $1.1 million. Therefore, Gavl spent 15 months developing technology to live stream with minimal latency and address network reliability challenges for agents using live streaming. This technology is key to the launch of live auction bidding.
What prompted Harris Capital to invest in Gavl?
According to Brad Harris, Managing Director of Harris Capital, the investment office of Flight Centre founder Geoff Harris, Harris Capital is thrilled to expand its partnership with Gavl. Brad Harris says that very few startups truly have a world-first technology, with significant barriers to entry and a huge market size to capitalize on, and Gavl is one of them. In its first full year of commercial operation, Gavl has experienced exponential growth, thanks to its management team’s brilliant job of bringing this highly technical project to market and rolling it out across Australia and New Zealand.
The total raise of $6 million Series A funding, kicked off by Harris Capital injecting a further $1.8 million into the business, will enable further development and innovation, including digital contract signing, deposit transfer facilitation between buyer and seller via the agent, and 360-degree camera and Artificial Intelligence integration. With 25 permanent staff, it will also allow Gavl to expand sales teams in new regions.
Joel, CEO of Gavl, says that the second round of funding will help Gavl invest in people and improve its sales and marketing efforts, and currently, the platform captures all bids made at its auctions, which allows Gavl to share auction results in real time and provide bidding analytics.
Gavl has enabled Australian real estate agents to broaden their auction audience by up to 300 per cent and has been used by industry-leading agencies such as Ray White, McGrath, Belle Property, Harcourts, and LJ Hooker to live stream auctions.
