(Yicai Global) Oct. 18 -- Casstime Auto Parts, a business-to-business (B2B) trading platform of Shenzhen Casstime Technologies Co. (Casstime), raised USD22.72 million (CNY150 million) in Series B Funding.

This financing will go mainly to continuous investment in research and development, as well as rapidly forming a business matrix to promote the development of a product market to transit from breadth to depth, 36Kr.com reported yesterday.

China has 200 million vehicles with an average lifetime of 4.5 years, and its industry enjoys a huge dividend. However, China's vehicle maintenance and repair market is rife with products of varying quality under chaotic management.

The auto parts industry has a long industrial chain and a complex category, and the total number of stock-keeping units (SKU) is over 100 million, said Jiang Yongxing, Casstime's founder. Traditionally, auto technicians must repeatedly communicate with car owners and the process often generates high costs and low efficiency. The rate of sales errors is also quite high in offline situations. The rate of the Casstime Auto Parts platform is less than 1 percent, however, Jiang said. "On the platform, uses can acquire the code of auto parts by entering their vehicle frame number and the name of the part. Categories on the platform are accurate down to each screw. Users can complete the maintenance and repair transaction with one click, thus enhancing industrial efficiency and the user experience, he added."

Casstime owns over 50 patents, such as a vehicle identification number (VIN) resolver, data engine and intelligent identification of common parts. Its core database has already accumulated more than 100 million VINs and 7 million SKUs. Cass Time's auto parts business encompasses 15 high-end brands, including Mercedes-Benz and BMW. As of September, over 5,000 vehicle maintenance and repair enterprises had registered on the platform, more than 200 suppliers have settled in, and its business covers over 60 cities nationwide. Its monthly revenue from transactions exceeds CNY100 million and this number doubles every two months.