Honcho, the North East reverse-auction marketplace, which has raised millions of pounds in funding, has ceased trading.
The Durham company was viewed as the future of insurtech, winning places on global accelerators and raising several million through fundraises. It was backed by Maven Capital Partners as well as VC Insurtech and the Seedrs crowdfunding platform to the tune of over £3m.
The statement on its website reads:
“After 3 years of trading and 5 years in the making we’re unfortunately packing up Honcho’s reverse-auction marketplace and placing it into retirement.
“Why you ask? Well in truth, we’ve found it difficult to acquire customers in a highly competitive space and the economics mean it’s costing more money to run things that we’re making from selling policies.
“We’d like to say a huge thanks to those that have supported us from start to end, without your help, we’d have never got things off the ground, so we’re extremely grateful.”
According to its most recent accounts, the company, which was registered as Honcho Markets, had seen its losses increase year-on-year. For the year ended 30 September 2021 its losses were £3.2m, compared to losses of £2.5m the year before.
Its total staff numbers were 10, including its 4 directors.
