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BMW, Mercedes Confirm Plan to Merge Mobility Services
BMW AG and Daimler AG have agreed to merge their ride-hailing and other mobility services into a 50:50 joint venture.
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BMW AG and Daimler AG have agreed to merge their ride-hailing and other mobility services into a 50:50 joint venture.
The plan, which was widely expected, will integrate existing services by both companies in five areas: car sharing, ride-hailing, parking, EV charging and integrated on-demand mobility. The companies did not cite a timetable for combining their mobility operations.
The partners vow to present a “holistic ecosystem” of seamlessly connected mobility options for their customers through a platform that can be rapidly expanded on a global scale. “We will not leave the task of shaping future urban mobility to others,” declares Daimler CEO Dieter Zetsche.
BMW’s DriveNow and Daimler’s Car2Go car-sharing services currently operate a combined fleet of 20,000 vehicles in 31 large cities. Their ride-hailing services—mytaxi, Clever Taxi, Beat and Chauffeur Privé—involve 140,000 drivers and 13 million customers.
The companies’ ParkNow and Parkmobile services enable drivers to find or reserve on-street parking and pay for it electronically. Their ChargeNow and Digital Charging Solutions services help users access to more than 143,000 charging points worldwide.
All those services can be integrated by BMW’s ReachNow and Daimler’s Moovel multimodal booking systems, which handle scheduling and payment through single platforms.
The two carmakers say the new venture will produce slight increases in their group-level pretax earnings this year. But Daimler also anticipates a significant impact on valuation and earnings for its financial services unit.
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