Munich/Stuttgart – BMW and Mercedes-Benz are selling their joint car-sharing subsidiary Share Now to Franco-Italian car conglomerate Stelantis. The companies announced Tuesday that a related agreement had been signed and details would not be disclosed. Antitrust authorities’ approval is yet to come.
BMW and Mercedes-Benz are now looking to expand their combined e-car charging service Charge Now and their mobility app Free Now, which provides customers with more than 180,000 e-scooters in more than 150 cities through partners such as Sixt, Miles and Share. will provide access to vehicles. Now, e-bikes, driverless cars and taxis. Customers increasingly wanted to use an app to choose the best route from A to B from the full range of mobility offers. “The new orientation enables us to scale up our activities more quickly and thus generate more profitable growth in the shortest possible time,” said BMW Manager Rainer Fürer.
Charging services and multi-mobility platforms are two major business segments with high growth potential. Last year, Free Now nearly tripled the number of transactions, and this year ten new partners will be integrated on the platform. Charge Now provides access to 300,000 charging points in Europe including full billing through service provider DCS.
Share Now was created in 2019 by merging Daimler’s carsharing Car2Go with BMW’s DriveNow – a year after Sixt sold its 50 percent stake in Drive Now to partner BMW for 209 million euros. However, the joint venture was in the red and was soon withdrawn from the United States, London, Brussels and other cities.
Stellantis subsidiary Free2Move now has an opportunity to expand car sharing in Europe with the acquisition of Share Now, according to BMW and Mercedes. Mercedes-Benz Director Gero Götzenberger said: “Even as Mercedes-Benz focuses more on its core business in the luxury segment in the future, car sharing will remain an important part of urban mobility and an essential element of the mobility proposition at Free Now ..”
Stelantis focused on growth from the acquisition. With 2 million subscribers, you win 3.4 million more for your own Free2move offers. The group said in Amsterdam it expected sales of 2.8 billion euros in 2030 and 700 million euros in 2025.
