Partly raises USD $50 million to expand Australia hiring

Partly has raised USD $50 million in a Series B funding round led by DST Global Partners, valuing the automotive software company at USD $500 million.

The funding will support hiring in Australia, where Partly is adding technical roles in software engineering, machine learning and data science. The recruitment drive is part of a broader expansion expected to more than double the company's global headcount this year.

Partly develops an artificial intelligence model called Interpreter for the automotive repair supply chain. The company says it has trained the model over five years using original equipment manufacturer catalogue and repair data, as well as transaction data from New Zealand, Australia, the UK and the Nordics.

Partly is targeting a fragmented vehicle repair market, where independent workshops operate alongside larger multi-site repair groups. In that environment, inaccurate parts data and manual procurement processes can increase costs and delay repairs, especially as vehicles become more complex and insurers maintain fixed pricing.

Those pressures have increased demand for software that helps repairers identify and source the correct parts more quickly. Partly is positioning its product around that problem while using the latest funding to deepen its engineering presence in Australia and build on its existing technical base in New Zealand.

DST Global Partners led the round, while existing investor Blackbird Ventures also participated.

Levi Fawcett, Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder of Partly, said the technology is significant in a sector where core workflows have changed little for decades.

"Not since the creation of the assembly line or EVs has the auto industry experienced significant innovation that simultaneously improves operational efficiency, industry profitability, and consumer value," said Levi Fawcett, Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder of Partly.

"We have spent five years building the AI infrastructure layer that the industry has been missing. The model architecture is extremely nuanced, there's a reason general models don't solve it, and why we've been able to own the frontier AI here," Fawcett said.

Hiring push

The latest expansion is centred on Australia, where Partly plans to add engineers and AI specialists closer to the repair businesses using its software. That local focus reflects the importance of the Australian vehicle repair sector to its growth plans and Partly's view that regional talent can help shape products for a global market.

Fawcett said the funding would allow further investment in recruitment across Australia and New Zealand. He described that effort as part of a broader ambition to build tools for the global automotive parts trade from a regional engineering base.

"Australia and New Zealand are home to exactly the kind of technical and AI talent we want building the future of automotive repair," Fawcett said.

"This raise lets us invest further in that talent locally and attract the best people in the country to come and build the future of the global parts industry with us," he said.

Investor backing

Blackbird Ventures, which has backed Partly since its early stages, said the company is tackling a problem that has long burdened repairers and their customers. The investor pointed to the difficulty of finding accurate parts information in existing software systems and the effect on repair times and costs.

"Australian repairers shouldn't need 30 clicks and a crystal ball to find the right part. As investors since the beginning, we've been impressed at how deep the team was willing to go to fix the core underlying problems, and how relentlessly they focus on user experience to delight an industry that has for too long suffered from mediocre software experiences that lead to real-world delay and expense," said Samantha Wong, Partner at Blackbird Ventures.

"Blackbird is proud to be supporting this Series B which will see them accelerate growth of their Australian office and global footprint," Wong said.

Founded in 2020, Partly has focused on software for automotive parts data, logistics and repair workflows. The new financing gives the company fresh capital to expand its workforce in Australia and extend its reach in a repair supply chain that still relies heavily on fragmented data and manual processes.