RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK – Get Spiffy, the on-demand car maintenance startup led by veteran entrepreneur Scot Wingo, has $9 million in new capital for further expansion.

Led by Durham-based Bull City Venture Partners, Spiffy announced Tuesday the close on new funding. The firm says it will “broaden car care services, expand geographies, and develop additional channels.”

The new funding comes just three weeks after Spiffy moved beyond mobile car maintenance such as car washes and oil changes to providing a new device that serves as a “fitness tracker” for vehicles.

Called Spiffy Blue, the new offering includes a Bluetooth-enabled device that serves as an on-board diagnostics sensor and provide customers with data through a mobile app. Selling for less than $50, Spiffy Blue plugs into the on-board diagnostics port, or OBD-II, of vehicles manufactured since 1996.

The move:

  • TurnedSpiffy into the national player via sales through Amazon and eBay – two firms he worked closely with during his ChannelAdvisor tenure.
  • Turned Spiffy from on-demand physical services at a few locations [five major metros] to software-delivered data and analytics, opening up future opportunities to help customers in more ways that oil and a wash

In fact. investor Visionary Private Equity Group cited Spiffy Blue as a reason for its investment.

“VPEG is excited to be an investor in Spiffy as they are capitalizing on their unique approach to market in a methodical and precise manner,” said Dr. Ron Zamber, chairman of VPEG, “Beyond the rapid rise in on-demand services, Spiffy via Spiffy Blue (a proprietary on-board diagnostics solution) is also well positioned to capitalize on the explosion in the IoT [internet of things]market which is predicted to generate $300 Billion annually by 2020 being led by manufacturing, transportation, and logistics.”

Wingo noted the firm continues to grow and has big plans.

“We continue to experience over 100 percent [year-over=year] growth and incredibly high customer satisfaction. We look forward to using the proceeds of this round to roll out more 5-star services, geographies, and channels,” Wingo said in a statement.

Joining Bull City Venture Partners in the round were Spiffy’s other existing investors (Visionary Private Equity Group, the North Carolina Venture Capital Multiplier Fund, Wolfpack Investor Network [WIN], and VentureSouth) along with a new backer MANN+HUMMEL.

“Just as e-commerce changed the retail landscape, on-demand services are changing consumer expectations around every touchpoint in a service interaction. Investing in Spiffy gives us the opportunity to explore the fascinating intersection of our products and their on-demand services,” said Charles Vaillant, MANN+HUMMEL’s chief technology officer, in the announcement.

The Mann+Hummel Group is a German manufacturing company with a focus on filtration technology.

Jason Caplain, general partner at Bull City Ventures and a backer of Wingo since Wingo co-founded ecommerce services provider ChannelAdvisor which he later took public, said the decision to invest again in Spiffy because of its “very impressive growth trajectory.”

“Since our first investment, Spiffy has grown from three to five markets, added several new services like mobile oil change, and dramatically expanded their fleet business,” Caplain noted.