Online marketplace for home services Timesaverz appoints Prashant Kirtane as its technology advisor

Mumbai-based Timesaverz Dotcom Pvt Ltd, which owns and operates online marketplace for home services Timesaverz.com, has appointed Prashant Kirtane as its technology advisor. Kirtane will be associated with the company in an advisory capacity, and work with the leadership team to lay down its mobile-first marketplace product & technology strategy.

Commenting on the appointment, Debadutta Upadhyaya, co-founder and CEO, Timesaverz.com, said, "Kirtane's experience in building products, especially around mobile and marketplace would be helpful at a stage when Timesaverz is stepping up its mobile-first strategy."

"The segment of home services is disorganised and has been a market waiting to be tapped. It will be interesting to work with the team in order to scale their business portfolio and operations using the mobile-first concept and by developing a mobile app suite with advanced features," added Kirtane.

Kirtane has over 16 years of experience and is also the co-founder and CTO of Travelmob.com, a social stay marketplace for vacation rental accommodation. In July 2013, HomeAway, Inc., a Texas-based online vacation marketplace, had acquired a controlling stake in Singapore-based Travelmob Pte Ltd, which owns and operates Travelmob.com. Kirtane had earlier also worked at companies like Yahoo and Tata Infotech Ltd.

He holds a BE degree in electronics from Veermata Jijabai Technological Institute, Mumbai.

The startup was co-founded by Debadutta and Lovnish Bhatia in July 2012. Before setting off on an entrepreneurial journey, Debadutta was leading video ad network Vdopia's APAC business. Prior to that, she was heading sales function for Yahoo India. Bhatia on the other hand has held leadership positions in companies like Vdopia, Aptech, Sony Entertainment Television, NDTV Media and Viacom 18, prior to Timesaverz.

According to the company, its marketplace connects home service seekers with home service providers. It currently has a network of over 1000 service partners. Each service partner goes through a process before enlisting with the platform that includes a thorough background check, verification of skill-sets and polishing of soft-skills.

Available in Mumbai and Pune (to be launched in Bangalore soon), the network of agents helps people outsource their home service requirements in the area of cleaning tasks, handymen jobs, appliances repairs and errands co-ordination. All the user has to do is visit the site, choose the task that needs to get done, select the date and time they want the job to be completed and pay for the same.

The company then uses its proprietary algorithms to assign the right service partner to complete the job. Quality service delivery on time is ensured through 'live' tracking of the entire process from the job request to job completion and feedback gathering through mobile phones.

A GSF Accelerator company, Timesaverz was one of the 12 startups that graduated from the accelerator's 2013 summer batch. Although a new concept in the Indian context, there are a number of players operating in this space in developed markets that include Thumbtack, Handy (previously Handybook) and Taskrabbit, among others.

In October last year, Timesaverz had raised an undisclosed amount in seed funding led by internet business professional Neville Taraporewalla and GSF Superangels founder Rajesh Sawhney.

Other investors who participated in the round included eTailing India founder Ashish Jhalani; Nitesh Kripalani, former digital business head at Sony Entertainment; as well as GSF Superangels like Indiamart founder Dinesh Agarwal; and Nish Bhutani, COO of Saffronart.