Daimler purchases Europcar stake in car2go, paving the way for a merger with BMW’s DriveNow

01 March 2018

Daimler Mobility Services announced today, Thursday 1 March, that it will acquire the 25 percent stake in car2go Europe GmbH from joint venture partner Europcar Group. This news follows BMW taking complete control of its ridesharing arm DriveNow on 29 January, purchasing rental company Sixt’s stake in the business, and paves the way for the planned merger of the leading car-sharing services.

In 2012, car2go Europe GmbH was created as a joint-venture, owned 75% by Daimler and 25% by Europcar. This acquisition therefore means that following approval of the transaction by the relevant authorities, Daimler Mobility Services will own all the car2go shares.

′Over the course of the last several months, we have intensified our investments in mobility services in order to create a holistic mobility system with a broad portfolio. As part of this strategy, we decided to fully acquire the remaining shares in car2go Europe,’ stated Daimler’s Head of Mobility Services Jörg Lamparter. ′We want to thank Europcar for their great support as we went from a car sharing start up to the leading car sharing company in the world,’ Lamparter added.

Daimler Mobility Services is poised to further expand its mobility portfolio, expand its customer base and enhance the customer experience through bundled mobility products. With the customer insights gained through 24 million rentals for both combustion engines and electric cars alone in 2017, car2go has laid the groundwork for Daimler’s CASE strategy as the company shifts to a fully connected, autonomous, shared and electric vehicle portfolio.

′I want to thank Europcar for their collaboration in supporting car2go’s expansion across Europe. We have collectively transformed car sharing from a trend to a lifestyle and have created a mobility community,’ stated Olivier Reppert, CEO car2go Group.

Caroline Parot, Europcar Group’s Chief Executive Officer, stated: ′We want to thank the Daimler Group for our longstanding partnership since 2012 within car2go Europe. This investment has taught us a great deal about car sharing.’

According to Europcar, the price Daimler paid for their 25% stake of car2go was €70 million. BMW paid €209 million for the acquisition of the 50% stake held in DriveNow by Sixt. DriveNow has therefore been valued higher than car2go, which is somewhat surprising as car2go is actually the larger of the two car-sharing companies. Whereas DriveNow has more than one million customers across Europe, car2go is present in Europe, North America and China, and has more than 3 million users worldwide. 

Europcar said the deal should be completed before the end of the second quarter and assuming regulatory approval, the planned merger of Car2Go and DriveNow could follow soon thereafter.

Photograph courtesy of Daimler