ARCHITECT SUCCESSES

SEE ALL
Champ Titles Raised $18M from Point72 Ventures
Champ Titles Raised $18M from Point72 Ventures

Architect Partners was the exclusive Financial Advisor to Champ Titles.

Transaction Overview

On March 27, 2024, Cleveland-based digital title and registration platform Champ Titles announced an $18 million Series C equity round led by Point72 Ventures with participation by existing investors.

Company Description

Champ Titles provides a digital title and registration suite to streamline the vehicle titling process. Their platform enables the creation of legal, digital titles for easy transfer and verification, serving insurance carriers, lenders, state governments, auto dealers, and owners. Stakeholders, including state motor vehicle departments, lenders, and vehicle owners, benefit from a unified and transparent system, where all information is readily accessible and transaction times are markedly reduced. The governance of the digital platform is established through clear guidelines, ensuring all parties adhere to the updated processes and regulations.

Champ Titles’ success is measured by the elimination of more than 5 million pieces of paper annually on average per state; a reduction in processing time from 40-60 days to a matter of hours; increased productivity of DMV title clerks processing more than five times as many titles per day; and the improved experience for consumers in each state that has adopted Champ Titles’ solutions. Over the last twelve months, the company has successfully onboarded new states including New Jersey, Kentucky, and Illinois, and expanded its relationship with West Virginia by creating the first National Digital Titling Clearinghouse (NDTC). Through these efforts, the company has grown rapidly with revenue increasing by more than 300% year over year. 

Founded in 2018 by CEO, Shane Bigelow, the company now has 63 employees and is headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio. 

Funding

In this Series C funding round, Champ Titles raised $18M from Point72 Ventures and existing investors including W.R. Berkley Corporation, Eos Venture Partners, Guidewire Software, and Rev1 Ventures, bringing the total amount raised since inception to $45M. 

In the prior Series B round, Champ Titles raised $13M from Guidewire Software, Eos Venture Partners, and Ally Ventures.

Before that, Champ Titles raised $13.5M in 2021 in a Series A. Emergents, now Architect Partners, served as the exclusive Financial Advisor for that financing. 

Competition

Champ Titles’ biggest competitors are existing state DMVs deciding to be a software company and developing solutions on their own or via large systems developers.  However, they also compete with other digital title networks such as Cario and Oxhead Alpha/Tezos. In addition, technology-enabled DMV solutions such as Fast Enterprises are seen as competitive but don’t offer the same efficacy.

 

Architect Partners’ Perspective

Champ Titles’ SaaS-based solutions present a compelling example of blockchain-enabled infrastructure solving real-world problems.  By focusing on the needs and pain points of legacy auto title, registration, and lien processing, Champ has leveraged the power of blockchain to transform critical government services.  The result is exponentially accelerated processing time for DMV constituents, with improved accuracy and reduced cost.  Yet Champ’s solutions capture many key benefits of on-chain data processing – which include trust, transparency, data integrity, security, and efficiency – without users even being aware of their blockchain foundations.  

While much attention is focused on recent resilience in crypto asset prices, we believe 2024 will see significant growth in non-speculative enterprise applications for distributed ledger technology.  Champ’s successful raise demonstrates investor interest in practical and scalable solutions to real-world problems.

Crypto Public Companies Snapshot

Crypto Public Companies Snapshot

Todd White
September 8, 2023
DOWNLOAD FULL REPORT

Consistent disclosure of reliable financial information to investors and markets is one of the primary objectives of the US federal securities laws. And yet even where accounting guidelines are clear, disparate reporting among similar companies can lead to confusing results. We saw this a few weeks ago with Bakkt’s acquisition of Apex, which made economic comparisons based on GAAP numbers alone difficult.

 

A lack of clarity can create even greater distortion. For example, historically there has been no specific accounting rule to report crypto assets in the U.S. The common treatment adopted by many companies – including Microstrategy, Marathon Digital, and Riot Platforms – treats digital assets such as Bitcoin as indefinite-lived intangibles, booking them at historical cost subject to “impairment” losses over time when prices fall below their carrying value. Such losses run through the income statement, land reduces balance sheet value, but without associated gains if prices recover. Some may view it as simply conservative, but during an up market both reported income and asset values may appear deflated against economic reality. To many investors this would seem confusing at best.

 

The Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) voted this week to approve a new rule addressing digital assets. Released in an exposure draft In March for public comment, the new rule will apply “fair value” accounting to recognize changes in digital assets values on the income statement and carry resulting balance sheet assets closer to current market value. FASB expects to issue the formal standard before year end, with mandatory effect for 2025, with the ability to adopt the rule earlier.

 

The rule isn’t perfect, and the potential for distortion may remain – for example, price volatility could create noisy results for companies that intend to hold their digital assets for the long term. But on balance treating crypto as a financial asset that is marked to market seems a sensible and more easily explained than previous treatment as an intangible.