In response to developments surrounding the industry’s multiplatform system initiative, Whann Technology Group provided a letter to Auto Remarketing and others in the industry to outline its position on the matter.

This is just the latest in a series of announcements on MPS that started on Feb. 23, when ADESA announced that it decided not to participate in the remarketing industry’s currently proposed multiplatform system initiative.

The next day, Manheim sent a message to Auto Remarketing reiterating its position to maintain a commitment to the wholesale market project.

ServNet announced Wednesday afternoon that it has also decided not to participate in the remarketing industry’s currently proposed MPS.

Below is the text from the letter authored by Keith Whann, founder of Whann Technology Group, that was provided to Auto Remarketing on Monday evening:

Over the past week, there has been a great deal of discussion about the multi-platform selling project ("MPS") after various parties shared their respective views. After some careful deliberation, we felt that in order to avoid confusion and provide clarity, it was necessary to share the Whann Technology Group (''WTG") perspective on this initiative.

We would like to thank Manheim and ADESA, the other parties in addition to WTG with a marketplace participating in the MPS Project. All of us have individually invested large amounts of time, effort and money on MPS and we appreciate the collective effort in bringing MPS to where it is today.

We want to begin by unequivocally saying we will continue to represent the interests of auctions, consignors, dealers and the industry as a whole and remain committed to working toward the establishment of an MPS that would link together and allow bidding across virtual auction marketplaces.

Some have said the technology costs associated with participating in MPS are high and that ultimately those costs would have to be borne by participants, buyers and sellers alike. With WTG Global, this is not the case. We treat the MPS as a natural extension of our marketplace. With WTG Global constructed as a marketplace of marketplaces, this allows each auction to have control of their customer's experience and maintain that local auction feel, yet have the reach to be able to sell vehicles worldwide.

We believe that MPS, when combined with mobile technology for image capture and condition report generation and the right marketplace structure, would put more eyes on more cars. This technology exists today and would allow consignors to offer vehicles for sale immediately when grounded, where they sit, and dealers access to view and purchase inventory without adding unnecessary cost to the process. MPS would also create a more efficient virtual auction marketplace that allows the user to have the easiest most productive experience regardless of where they do business.

Such a system also removes barriers of entry for individual auctions and remarketers and delivers the type of efficiencies in the marketplace that our customers and partners have been seeking.

The WTG investment on technology initiatives facing our industry has been and continues to be significant, but we consider it to be both a necessary and worthwhile investment. We have made the expenditure so consignors and individual auctions do not have to do so. An auction can have access to the MPS through WTG Global simply by using our API to push inventory from its management system to the auction's microsite within our marketplace. This is all done at no upfront cost to the auction.

We hope this provides you with an understanding of how WTG Global works with MPS and our position on this important initiative.

Keith Whann, Founder
Whann Technology Group