Self-proclaimed skip hire disruptor, London’s Skrap has raised £1.2m and plans expansion to cover other construction hire needs.
Skrap, a London-based startup, has raised £1.2m in seed funding as it sets out to transform how everything is hired in the construction industry by making it available on-demand. It claims a reputation as a ‘skip hire disruptor’ and plans to innovate in other parts of the industry including concrete, portable toilets, and machinery.
Founded in 2017, Skrap is a construction hire marketplace connecting construction businesses with on-demand skip and construction hire-related services. The entire process is managed via a mobile app (Apple iOS or Android).
Founders Marwan Field, Hussain Hilli and Ahmed Rao experienced problems while running a construction business. Logistics were unorganised and fragmented; prices were asymmetric, and the marketplace of suppliers and brokers were doing everything manually.
Skrap was founded with a vision of allowing SME builders to order any construction hire service at the click of a button. Skrap says its 25-strong team is building the world’s first app dedicated to automating construction hire. It has been trialled with 100s of suppliers across London, Manchester and Birmingham to complete over 10,000 deliveries to 1000s of construction companies, large and small. Skrap aims to automate entire construction hire supply chains across major cities globally over the coming years.
According to Skrap, almost 100m tonnes of construction waste is collected in the UK annually. Construction businesses spend £5bn in collecting this waste, and a further £15bn on other hire services.
Skrap’s funding round
The fundraise was led by Vanneck Investments, with participation from a host of entrepreneurs and angels investors including Charles Songhurst, Eamon Jubbawy (Onfido), Anil Stocker (MarketFinance), Paul Huntingdon (ARM), Adrian Beecroft, Dennis Stevenson, Peter Brodnicki (MAB), Jay Radia (Yieldify, Reachdesk), and James Hind (Carwow).
Hussain Hilli, co-founder at Skrap commented:
“We’re thrilled to have some amazing investors on board and look forward to leaning on their expertise as we broaden the horizons for Skrap. Our team has huge ambitions to scale across the UK and globally. Having laid the foundations in skip hire, we are fast expanding in all construction hire verticals. Skrap is making its mark in industry by introducing the first mobile app that makes it simple and convenient for construction companies to access resources they need.”
“The UK construction hire industry is a £20bn market, yet it is poorly served with services not fit-for-purpose in a digital age. Skrap is well positioned to bring innovative solutions to help transform the industry and make it one beacon of industry once again”.
SME appeal
This is the latest in a long series of occasional Extranet Evolution posts looking at SME-oriented solutions in construction. Earlier this year, for example, EE covered the London launch of Buildiro, and, in May 2019, the Snaffle mobile app – both enabling tools and materials purchasing by tradespeople.
Most construction markets are fragmented and heavily dependent upon small and medium-sized businesses. Other solutions aimed at small builders include Australia’s Tenderfield, and SmallBuilders, the UK’s BuilderStorm, California’s eSUB and Corecon, and New Zealand’s TidyBuild,
Last month (July 2020), Corecon announced a new mobile application geared specifically for construction field staff who often travel between office and jobsite. As it uses the same APIs used by Corecon’s browser solution, information can be entered in either solution, eliminating the need for data synchronisation across devices.
Update (30 September 2020) – Skrap is not unique in trying to connect skip-hiring services; some individual waste management firms are looking to do the same. For example, Stoke-on-Trent, UK-based skip-hire firm H Brown Recycling worked with Nottingham-based digital marketing agency Adtrak to offer a similar facility.
