Back Market operates an online marketplace focused on professionally refurbished smartphones and electronic devices, offering like-new products with a one-year warranty and a 30-day money-back guarantee. The company emphasizes quality control and aims to improve product reliability to increase consumer confidence in the refurbished sector. It serves more than 6 million customers worldwide and hosts over 1,500 sellers on its platform. Back Market employs about 650 people across four offices in New York, Berlin, Paris, and Bordeaux. The company plans to invest in product quality and a world-class customer experience while expanding its global customer base, with a particular push into the U.S. market. Back Market operates an online marketplace for refurbished smartphones, laptops, tablets, headphones, gaming consoles and other consumer electronics. The company does not refurbish devices itself; instead roughly 1,500 third-party companies list inventory on the platform. Back Market reports about 5 million customers globally and says its overall defective rate sits at roughly 5%, with a defect warranty included on purchases. The startup invests heavily in merchant services, parts sourcing and quality control to improve reliability and consumer trust. It positions itself within the circular economy and emphasizes sustainability as part of its value proposition. Back Market is active in 13 markets including the U.S. and Japan and plans launches in Canada, Greece, Sweden and Slovakia. Back Market runs a marketplace for refurbished smartphones and other electronic devices by partnering with certified third-party sellers rather than refurbishing devices in-house. The platform requires a 12-month warranty for listed products to reassure buyers. It currently works with about 1,000 certified sellers and is live in the U.S., France, Spain, Germany, Italy, Belgium, the U.K. and Austria. With fresh capital, the company plans to expand its quality-control team and introduce new services around refurbishments, such as sourcing spare parts and implementing test protocols. Management intends to concentrate on core markets rather than rapid country expansion, starting with the U.S., U.K. and Germany. The recent funding will support efforts to capture more of the refurbishment value chain and scale operations. Back Market operates an online marketplace that aggregates over 270 refurbishment factories to sell refurbished smartphones, laptops, game consoles, TVs, headphones, coffee machines and more. The company aims to make refurbishment a mainstream alternative to buying new devices by building a trusted brand and quality assurance across partners. Back Market claims it can manage pricing, fail rates and partner performance by choosing which factories to work with. Over the past three years the platform has generated over $110 million in gross merchandise volume. Its service is live in France, Germany, Spain, Belgium and Italy and the company has recently expanded to the U.S. Executives emphasize that many customers are satisfied with devices one or two years old, creating growth opportunity for the refurbishment market. Back Market is a French greentech platform that sells refurbished smartphones, tablets, televisions and other household appliances. It works with more than 130 factories and refurbishing workshops to offer secondhand electronics at a discount. The company says it saves customers 30–50% compared with the price of new products and helps remove over 100 tonnes of electronic waste each year. Launched in 2014 by Thibaud Hug de Larauze, Quentin Le Brouster and Vianney Vaute, Back Market is positioning itself as a trusted third party between refurbishers, manufacturers and distributors. The startup plans to accelerate international expansion, aiming to open in new countries by the end of 2017, and says Germany, Spain, Italy and Belgium already account for more than 30% of its business. To support growth and partnerships it intends to double its workforce from 32 by the end of 2017.

Total raised

$1.0B

Funding rounds

5

Latest round

Series E

Latest activity

Jan 2022