Hi Gabriele,
1) What Key trends will shape the future of car sharing?
The car-sharing industry is passing through significant growth and transformation, driven by technological advancements, evolving consumer preferences and environmental considerations. Rising vehicle prices, steep maintenance costs, and ongoing debates over parking are creating significant obstacles for personal car ownership. As cities tighten regulations and push zero-emission targets, car sharing is emerging as a critical component of urban mobility. Moreover, on 2025, we are expecting strong influences on the car sharing industry from macro-economic developments, a struggling automotive industry and a growing regulatory force for sustainable mobility. However, we can identify four pivotal developments to watch for in 2025: Insurances as a key challenge, Fleet diversification: news makes and models, Electrification: essential, but challenging, Shifting focus: from expansion to profitability.
Insurances as a key challenge: Car sharing operators are increasingly dealing with insurance challenges, as traditional insurers often decline to cover damages to shared vehicles. This stems from the unique complexities of the car sharing model that traditional insurance policies are not designed to address. A major issue is the difficulty in proving when and how damage occurred and identifying who is responsible, problems compounded by the lack of clear documentation in many cases. AI-powered tools are crucial for bridging this gap. These technologies provide evidence with timestamps and user identification, enabling operators to hold the responsible party accountable.
Fleet diversification: news makes and models: Operators continue to evaluate new makes and models to add to their car sharing fleets. One key driver is availability; following the COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent chip crisis, many vehicle components and models became scarce or even unavailable.
Electrification: essential, but challenging: As governments, communities and cities enforce stricter zero-emission targets, car sharing operators will continue to integrate EVs into their fleets to meet these requirements. Currently, one in four European station-based and free-floating car sharing services operate all-electric fleets. However, the transition comes with challenges. In some markets, like the Netherlands, operators are mandated to switch entirely to battery electric vehicles (BEVs) but receive little government support for building charging infrastructure or providing incentives. Other regions are taking an indirect approach: heavily penalizing internal combustion engine vehicles (ICEVs) and banning them from city centers. However, both approaches are pursuing the same sustainability goals: Low-emission zones by calling for more low-emission vehicles while phasing out high-emission vehicles. Additionally, operating electric fleets poses unique challenges, including higher overhead costs and complex logistics, while vehicle procurement remains prohibitively expensive.
Shifting focus: from expansion to profitability
After more than three decades of growth, the car sharing industry is shifting its focus from expansion to profitability. Some operators are consolidating their operations by scaling back from less profitable regions and concentrating on markets where they can achieve sustainable growth. To enhance profitability, operators are striving for greater operational excellence. A growing trend is insourcing, which allows companies to maintain control over key business processes and retain critical business knowledge in-house, reinforcing their competitive edge. Despite these adjustments, the global car sharing market continues to grow. According to a Frost & Sullivan study, the global car sharing industry will double in size between 2025 and 2030.
2) How does technology facilitate and enhance car sharing services?
There are several ways through which technology improves car-sharing services, such as making the process more efficient, cost-effective and user-friendly for both operators and customers. The first advantage regards fleet management, since AI analyzes vehicle health data (e.g., engine status, battery life) to schedule maintenance proactively, reducing breakdowns and repair costs. Another benefit pertains to fleet allocation as algorithms predict demand patterns using historical data, traffic conditions and events to position cars where they’re needed most, maximizing availability. Finally, optimization concerns efficiency in terms of costs since AI analyzes demand in real- time, adjusting pricing dynamically, ensuring better availability while maximizing revenue. Also, AI-driven analytics help operators reduce operational expenses by optimizing fuel/charging costs, and insurance rates.
3) How does OCTO encourage the activities of car sharing operators?
One of the main challenges for rental and shared mobility operators is to effectively manage all daily activities and protect their assets, maintaining high customer engagement. OCTO’s technology allows to streamline processes and optimize costs avoiding any fraud or thefts, by promoting a safer driving behavior which lead to lower insurance premiums. Additionally, mobility operators can control the mileage of vehicles by reducing extra costs relying on accurate dashboards which optimize both ordinary and predictive maintenance.
4) What Kind of advancements in terms of solutions and products do you envisage in the near future?
Autonomous electric vehicle and sustainability are the Key topics of a contemporary challenge. This is why we need to adopt new models for more effective and sustainable urban mobility. It deals with a big challenge that needs a joint effort among different stakeholders in terms of regulations, infrastructures and innovation. As a technological provider, our task is to continue making our services more robust to enhance our business performance, optimizing fleet management and improving customer experience. First, we keep on providing data to optimize vehicles distribution based on demand reducing idle time. Secondly, we will refine our secure digital key solution which lead users to access vehicles via their smartphone, improving convenience and safety. Then, thanks to our accurate algorithm we will support car sharing operators to set- up dynamic pricing models based on driving behavior which incentivize safer driving and reduce operational costs.