Impel is a vertical AI company that is transforming automotive retailing. And the company’s automotive AI platform is used by thousands of automotive OEMs, dealers and third party marketplaces in more than 50 countries. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Impel CEO and co-founder Devin Daly to learn more about the company.
Core Products
What are the company’s core products and features? Daly said:
“Impel’s AI-powered customer lifecycle management platform enables auto dealers, manufacturers, and marketplaces to deliver hyper-personalized experiences at scale. It’s quickly become the leading AI platform and the de facto standard for automotive AI. Our imaging, merchandising and communication solutions drive increased business performance and better experiences at every touchpoint in the customer journey. By enabling retailers to harness the power of AI, they are able to more effectively and efficiently engage customers in every operational area of the dealership, from sales to service and merchandising to inventory acquisition.”
Evolution Of Impel’s Technology
How has the company’s technology evolved since launching? Daly shared:
“Impel began its history in the auto industry more than 10 years ago as Spincar, the category creator for interactive 360-degree virtual vehicle walkarounds. Over time, we added additional merchandising products like test drive videos and model-specific multimedia feature showcases that enabled shoppers to fully explore and experience a vehicle before ever setting foot in the dealership. Eventually, through acquisitions and our own development efforts, we began leaning heavily into Artificial Intelligence (AI).”
“We enhanced our merchandising capabilities with computer vision AI technology, and we added an entirely new set of communication capabilities powered by generative conversational AI. Today, our end-to-end customer lifecycle management platform has become an AI operating system for retailers – fully integrated with their existing systems and working alongside their staff members in virtually every department. In fact, through direct integrations with more than 100 other platform and technology providers, our automotive AI technology is now powering a significant portion of the automotive retailing ecosystem.”
Significant Milestones
What have been some of the company’s most significant milestones? Daly cited:
“We’ve had many milestones over the past ten years. One of the most significant ones occurred in 2022 when we rebranded from SpinCar to Impel. The name change reflected our growth and evolution and better conveyed our mission – moving the auto shopping experience forward. One of our more recent milestones took place in early 2023 when we received a $104 million growth equity investment from Silversmith Equity Partners.”
“We’ve also completed two acquisitions over the past several years, including Pulsar AI (Tbilisi, GE) and Carlabs.ai (Los Angeles, CA), which rapidly accelerated and expanded our AI capabilities. We’re proud to have been recognized as a certified partner by many OEMs, including General Motors, Hyundai, Stellantis (Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep, Ram), Audi of America, Jaguar-Land Rover, Porsche, Maserati and Kawasaki. We’ve also established meaningful strategic partnerships and integrations with industry giants such as Carfax, Cars.com, CarGurus, Edmunds, ACV Auctions, CDK, Cox Automotive Australia, and many more.”
Customer Success Stories
When asking Daly about customer success stories, he highlighted:
“We’ve driven measurable business results for some of the most recognized dealer groups in the world, including Kia, Toyota, Audi, Buick, Acura, and Ford.
Funding
When asking Daly about the company’s funding and revenue details, he revealed:
“Impel has raised more than $130 million in growth funding over the last 6 years. The company operates in 51 countries around the world. To date, Impel has delivered more than 20 billion shopper interactions, influencing $5 billion in Sales and Service revenue for more than 6,000 auto dealers.”
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates the company from its competition? Daly concluded:
“Impel is the only company in the auto industry to provide an end-to-end, enterprise grade AI customer lifecycle management platform, with an unmatched global partner ecosystem of more than 100 providers and integrations. Impel’s industry-leading AI platform was purpose-built for automotive retailing and is powered by a proprietary blend of Large Language Models (LLMs) and consumer behavioral data.”
“Impel’s unique ‘Automotive Optimization Layer’ that provides retailers with an added level of control for ensuring brand compliant AI responses optimized for dealer and OEM business outcomes. We continuously train and customize our AI models based on hundreds of millions of automotive retailing conversations and behavioral insights across thousands of dealerships.”
