Motorway (brand)

Motorway is a used car marketplace based in the UK. It allows users to sell their car to verified dealers in a nationwide network.
Users enter their car’s details and receive an instant online valuation for their vehicle. This estimated sale price is generated based on offers placed by dealers for similar vehicles, together with real-time automotive market data.
The company also offers an online stock acquisition marketplace for car dealers. This platform allows private sellers to sell cars directly to verified dealers across the UK. Dealers become notified of cars that suit their requirements once they become available, and allows them to place offers in a daily online sale.
History.
The company was founded by Tom Leathes, Alex Buttle and Harry Jones. They had previously founded Top10, the broadband comparison website which was bought by uSwitch in 2010.
Motorway launched in July 2017, raising an angel round of £500,000. The company raised £2.75 million at seed level funding, with investors including LocalGlobe, a seed stage venture firm founded by Robin Klein and Marchmont Ventures (founded by Momondo and Cheapflights CEO Hugo Burge), as well as Zoopla-founder Alex Chesterman.
In May 2019, Motorway launched its first TV advert campaign. It featured a couple driving along when the Satnav, knowing they want to sell the car, suggests heading to Motorway.
Motorway raised a further £11 million in Series A funding in 2019, with investors again led by Marchmont Ventures and LocalGlobe. This brought the company's total funding up to £14.3 million.
It was awarded the “highly commended” prize in the Used Car Product of the Year 2019 category in the Used Car Awards.
In January 2020 the founders announced the service was receiving over 100,000 enquiries per month. The same month, Motorway launched a radio advert campaign on UK commercial radio stations. The ad featured TV actor Neil Morrissey.
In June 2020, after resuming trading after the UK Covid-19 national lockdown, Motorway sees £1.39m in used car sales on the platform in a single day. 
Research.
In January 2018, the company released a report in diesel prices, showing the value of diesel vehicles had declined by 5% in 2017, compared to a 10% price increase in petrol car prices. Some diesel cars fell in value by 26.3%. The figures were linked with the incoming government taxes on diesel vehicles, introduced that year by the UK government. A new study in 2019 found that used diesel cars had declined in value by 10.3% over the last two years.
The company also launched a major investigation into the “price chipping” practices used by second-hand car dealers and online car buyers. The research showed that the price consumers were offered online was higher than the amount they actually received, with the average drop across all companies surveyed being 6%. Cars valued under £5,000 could be “chipped down” by as much as 11%.