LIVE
AirGarage raises $23M Series B led by Headline, Founders Fund + Fourthline Capital
400+ parking locations managed across 40+ states
11 million+ drivers served to date
Company reports cash-flow positive operations
Founded 2017 at Arizona State University
Owners keep 70% - AirGarage keeps 30%
CEO Jonathon Barkl named to Forbes 30 Under 30
LIVE
AirGarage raises $23M Series B led by Headline, Founders Fund + Fourthline Capital
400+ parking locations managed across 40+ states
11 million+ drivers served to date
Company reports cash-flow positive operations
Founded 2017 at Arizona State University
Owners keep 70% - AirGarage keeps 30%
CEO Jonathon Barkl named to Forbes 30 Under 30
The Story
A boring asset class, rebuilt from the phone up
Parking is a $131 billion industry in the United States, and for decades it has run on paper tickets, broken meters and attendant booths. AirGarage's wager is that the lot was never the problem - the software was.
Founded in 2017 by three Arizona State University students, AirGarage is a full-stack parking operator. Instead of selling a widget to parking companies, it becomes the parking company: it takes over a lot or garage and handles everything - mobile payments, dynamic pricing, license-plate cameras, enforcement, maintenance and marketing - then splits the revenue with the property owner. The owner does nothing and sees more money; the driver pays from a phone with no gate to fight.
The result is a company that looks like a technology startup on the inside and a parking operator on the street. That combination - engineers writing pricing algorithms while a distributed field crew scans plates in a lot across the country - is the whole idea.
“
At AirGarage, we're bringing a unique technology + operations lens to the parking industry.
- JONATHON BARKL, CO-FOUNDER & CEO
What It Does
Two sides, one operating system
On the supply side, AirGarage signs up real estate owners and managers - office landlords, hotels, churches, independent lot owners and asset managers. Roughly 55-60% of these owners hold parking almost by accident; it came attached to a building. AirGarage turns that afterthought into a managed, measured line of revenue.
On the demand side, more than 11 million drivers have used AirGarage to find, compare and pay for hourly, daily or monthly parking across the US and Canada - through its app, or via aggregators like SpotHero and Google Maps.
Who signs up
The Owners
Real estate executives, asset and property managers, hotels, churches and independent lot owners. Clients have included Meta, Hines and Greystar. 5,000+ owners supported.
Who parks
The Drivers
11M+ people who want to park without a gate, a booth or a broken meter - just a phone. 4.2★ average driver rating across locations.
The Problem
Where $20 billion a year quietly leaks out
Americans waste an estimated $20 billion a year on parking-related costs, and there are roughly eight parking spaces for every vehicle in the country. Most of that inventory is priced badly, enforced loosely and measured not at all.
Legacy operators typically apply dynamic pricing to only about a fifth of their bookings and lean on gates, tickets and staffed booths. AirGarage says it prices 100% of bookings and skips the gate entirely - occupancy data flows in from cameras, rates adjust in real time, and enforcement is handled by a field network rather than a lift-arm barrier.
Dynamic pricing coverage
Share of bookings priced by real-time demand - AirGarage vs. a typical legacy operator (company figures).
Source: AirGarage / Contrary Research. Approximate, self-reported.
Business Model
Keep 30, give back 70, align everyone
AirGarage's core pricing is a revenue share. The owner keeps roughly 70% of gross parking revenue; AirGarage keeps about 30% and covers operations. There is no setup cost to the owner and no charge to browse for drivers.
70%Property Owner
30%AirGarage
Illustrative gross-revenue split. AirGarage covers payments, pricing, enforcement, maintenance and marketing from its share.
Because AirGarage only makes money when the lot makes money, the incentive to raise revenue is baked in - the opposite of a fixed management fee. The company also rents out roughly a quarter of its lots for non-parking uses like events and film shoots, and it reached cash-flow positive operations before raising its largest round.
Products & Services
One connected system
Dynamic Pricing
Rates adjust automatically in real time based on occupancy and demand - applied across all bookings.
LPR & Aerial Cameras
License-plate and overhead cameras detect entry and exit and identify cars by plate, color, make and model.
Mobile Payments
QR-code or text-to-pay parking that removes gates, booths and broken meters from the equation.
Owner Dashboard
Real-time view of revenue, occupancy, driver behavior and market trends - the "Asset Intelligence" layer.
Space Force
A gig-worker enforcement network; contractors scan plates and issue citations, earning per paid ticket.
Driver App
Consumer app to find, compare and reserve hourly, daily and monthly parking across the US and Canada.
iOS & Android
Text-to-pay
No gates
Real-time analytics
Aggregator distribution
The Landscape
Where it sits in the market
The parking world splits into legacy operators, technology platforms and consumer booking apps. AirGarage is unusual because it spans all three - it operates the lot, builds the software and reaches the driver.
SP+Legacy operator - millions of spaces, attended lots, gates.
LAZ ParkingLegacy operator founded 1981; thousands of locations.
MetropolisComputer-vision payment infrastructure.
FLASHHardware-as-a-service parking tech platform.
PassportMobile pay & permitting for cities.
SpotHeroConsumer booking aggregator (also a partner).
The difference: incumbents mostly manage for a fee, price statically and rely on gates and booths. Pure software players sell tools to those operators. AirGarage instead takes operational control end-to-end on a revenue share, prices everything dynamically and enforces with cameras plus a field crew - which is what lets it show owners measurable revenue lifts (a reported 84% at one location, 200% at another) rather than a flat contract.
Timeline
From driveways to downtown garages
2017
Founded at Arizona State
Jonathon Barkl, Scott Fitsimones and Chelsea Border launch AirGarage as a peer-to-peer driveway-rental marketplace.
2018
Pivot to managing lots
The company shifts from renting driveways to operating church, hotel and business parking lots.
2019
Seed round & mobile payments
Raises $2.3M led by Floodgate and rolls out mobile payments and the "Space Force" enforcement network.
2020
COVID pivot to downtown owners
As operators default on downtown lots, AirGarage introduces its 70-30 revenue share and finds stronger product-market fit.
2021
$12.5M Series A led by a16z
Andreessen Horowitz leads a Series A to scale full-stack parking operations nationwide.
2023
Forbes 30 Under 30
CEO Jonathon Barkl is recognized on Forbes 30 Under 30 in Consumer Technology.
2025
$23M Series B, 400+ locations
Raises a Series B led by Headline while cash-flow positive, managing 400+ locations across 40+ states.
Funding
Who's backing it
| Round | Amount | Date | Lead & Investors |
|---|
| Seed | $2.3M | Jun 2019 | Floodgate, Founders Fund |
| Series A | $12.5M | Oct 2021 | Andreessen Horowitz, Founders Fund, Floodgate, Abstract Ventures |
| Series B | $23M | Jul 2025 | Headline, Founders Fund, Fourthline Capital |
Total raised to date: ~$40M. Valuation undisclosed. Revenue figures are third-party estimates; company reports cash-flow positivity.
Expertise & Culture
Technology plus the unglamorous parts
AirGarage's edge is a willingness to own the messy, physical side of an industry most software companies avoid. Its engineers build pricing and computer-vision systems; its operations team and gig-worker "Space Force" handle the citations, the maintenance and the on-the-ground reality of a lot. The company is remote-friendly and pragmatic, reaching profitability before its biggest raise - unusual restraint for a venture-backed startup.
Full-stack operations
Computer vision / LPR
Dynamic pricing
Revenue-share model
Capital-efficient
Remote-first
Worth Knowing
Details that stick
- AirGarage started as "AirGarage 1.0" - essentially an Airbnb for driveways, letting college students rent out unused spaces.
- Its enforcement arm is branded the "Space Force," where contractors earn roughly $2 for every ticket that gets paid.
- About a quarter of AirGarage lots get rented for non-parking uses like film shoots and events.
- The three founders met as undergraduates at Arizona State University.
- The team pitches a bigger vision: an "API for space," with lots reused as micro-warehouses and EV charging hubs.
- The pandemic - which cut revenue sharply - is exactly where the company found its durable product-market fit.
FAQ
Quick answers
What does AirGarage do?
AirGarage is a full-stack parking management company that operates parking lots and garages for real estate owners - handling payments, dynamic pricing, enforcement, maintenance and marketing - and offers drivers an app to find and pay for parking.
How does AirGarage make money?
It uses a revenue-share model, typically keeping about 30% of gross parking revenue while the property owner keeps ~70%, with no setup cost for owners and free browsing for drivers. It also earns from alternative lot uses like events and filming.
Who founded AirGarage and when?
It was founded in 2017 by Jonathon Barkl (CEO), Scott Fitsimones (CTO) and Chelsea Border, who met at Arizona State University.
How much funding has AirGarage raised?
Roughly $40M in total, including a $2.3M seed (2019), a $12.5M Series A led by Andreessen Horowitz (2021), and a $23M Series B led by Headline with Founders Fund and Fourthline Capital (2025).
How big is AirGarage?
Based in San Francisco with around 80 employees, it manages 400+ parking locations across 40+ states and has served more than 11 million drivers while operating cash-flow positive.
Links, interviews & press
Profile compiled from public sources. Figures such as revenue and valuation are approximate or self-reported where noted.
