SpotHero acquires Parking Panda

SpotHero is an app that allows you, a driver in search of a space, to reserve and prepay for a spot in a parking garage before you even leave the house. Parking Panda came at the problem from the other direction by focusing on B2B services and event parking. Now, SpotHero has acquired Parking Panda to expand the parking spaces that can be reserved to nearly 5,000 in North America.

Parking Panda may be the business being acquired, but it was no slouch on its own. It had partnered with major-league sports teams and their venues, as well as theaters, convention centers and other event spaces. Parking Panda made moves into Canada in 2016, so the acquisition gives Chicago-based SpotHero an entry into that market as well, bringing the current total of cities using the SpotHero service to 47 in 2017.

The top of the parking company’s food chain will remain unchanged. SpotHero CEO and co-founder Mark Lawrence will continue to be CEO, and Parking Panda CEO and founder Adam Zilberbaum will come along to SpotHero, as will COO James Bain.

In the past five years, SpotHero has raised more than $20 million. The company expects to park 20 million cars in 2017 alone, thanks to this acquisition. And in addition to expanding to new cities, the company is laying the foundation to enable shared driverless autonomous cars to park themselves while the fleet owner or current user pays via app.