Sofico Services Australia has put a call out to its customers including SG Fleet, Eclipx, Summit, Toyota Fleet Management and MacMillan Shakespeare, and any fleet management organisation that uses Sofico’s Miles software, to join with it and pilot a bespoke car-sharing platform.
The idea is to develop it as an add-on to the Miles system that the FMOs are already using to manage their own clients’ fleets, said Greg Cowell, Sydney-based CaaS and MaaS product manager for the global services group Sofico.
They can then brand it as their own and offer it to clients who can earn extra money from their vehicle assets by letting their employees use fleet vehicles which would otherwise be parked up and idle.
“Our customer would need to be willing to have a go at something different, and their customer would also need to be willing to try something different to give their staff the ability to get something which they don’t already have,” said Cowell, speaking on the side of an event celebrating Sofico’s 20 years in Australia.
“This would be white labelled. We’re effectively giving them something that they can sell. It’s a new stream of income where everyone wins,” said Cowell.
He said the idea grew out of a product Sofico co-created with a car-share platform in Europe. The Australian pilot is designed to test the idea to get more value out of a current fleet’s assets, and to give employees of any fleet that ends up using access to a benefit they don’t presently get.
For example, said Cowell, the “product can be applied to a person needing a corporate fleet vehicle, for example a van to go to Bunnings on the weekend.” The pricing of using such a vehicle for personal use can be set by the FMO and their customer using the product. “It brings money from outside the pot into our pot.”
To work, vehicles in the Miles system will be marked to join the carshare platform designed for a specific fleet community. Fleet managers who adopt the platform will be able to add vehicles and drivers to the system. Payments can be processed via a universal platform like Stripe.
Like the Miles platform which can be configured in inestimable ways to suit the client be they automotive finance, leasing or fleet software provider — the car-share platform can too.
For example, a payment may be required to be made before the vehicle is unlocked for the designated driver. The idea is to create a booking app as the primary tool for drivers. It will be linked to the Miles platform and fleet portal with functionality for administration such as security.
“We have a concrete opportunity,” said Cowell, adding, “We’d like to commence the pilot at the end of first quarter of 2023.”
