Toyota Financial Services (TFS) announced Wednesday a partnership with Launch Mobility to develop a product designed to make previously leased vehicles available for short-term rentals to rideshare drivers.
The companies are currently working on a pilot they expect to introduce to select markets by the end of the calendar year, according to TFS.
“We are uniquely positioned to meet the needs of drivers who are interested in ridesharing but lack an appropriate vehicle,” TFS president and chief executive officer Mike Groff said in a news release.
“TFS has the off-lease vehicles, Launch Mobility has the technology, and Toyota dealers have the geographic presence and unparalleled vehicle servicing capabilities.”
In addition to input from Toyota's network of dealers, TFS said development of the new product will include the use of resources across the Toyota organization such as its global Mobility Services Platform developed and operated by Toyota Connected.
“With its commitment to innovation, Toyota Financial Services is a great partner for our robust and flexible solution that enables clients to quickly launch, experiment, and scale in the mobility services space,” added Paul Hirsch, chief executive officer of Launch Mobility.
Cloud-based incentive solutions provider Xactly announced Tuesday that Cox Automotive has begun using its platform to view data more strategically and design plans aimed at facilitating better performance across their sales organization.
“People are our most valuable resource. We recognized that if we wanted to inspire our sales organization we had to first inspire the team that supports them – the compensation team,” Cox Automotive senior director of sales compensation Justin Richie said in a news release. “It’s more than calculating commissions…it’s inspiring a sales team to be the best they can be. We use Xactly to inspire this performance.”
With Xactly, Cox Automotive has automated its entire compensation process and is achieving 99 percent accuracy on more than 1 million transactions monthly, according to Xactly.
Additionally, via Xactly Analytics, the company can examine attainment, payout correlations, distribution curves and participation scatter charts.
“Xactly Connect has taken our multitude of source systems and pulled them all together – saving 172 hours per month. We have been able to repurpose all of that time adding more value to the business,” added Jessica Owen, director of sales incentive compensation at Cox Automotive.
Auction Edge announced Tuesday it will merge its EDGE Pipeline product with EDGE Lookout to provide independent auctions with a seamless web platform in December.
The integration will include enhancements designed to bring less friction and more accessibility on all types of devices.
In addition to being responsive to any screen size, key updates to the national wholesale marketplace include a new interface design and an all-new search engine.
“This is not really an update as much as it is a complete migration to an all-new system. The new platform will merge with EDGE Lookout to bring users the best of both worlds,” Auction Edge announced in a news release.
With the Auction Edge’s newly single integrated system, auctions can market vehicles in-lane via both simulcast and buy-now/make-offer events.
“The single national marketplace for independent auctions is now poised for even more growth in 2018,” the company said. “This is the beginning of a new era for EDGE Pipeline and Auction Edge as a whole. Moving to this new platform gives Edge the ability to deliver new features and innovations at a much faster pace, and charts a roadmap for the future.”
Liquid Motors has entered a new partnership that will combine its auto marketing and remarketing solutions with WeGoLook’s on-demand, in-person auto condition inspections and reports.
The companies are currently completing the final phases of integration and expect to launch their collaborative solution by the first quarter of next year, Liquid Motors said in a news release.
“This is a big win for remarketers and others in the automotive industry,” Liquid Motors chief executive officer Michael Daseke said in the news release. “Through Liquid Motors and WeGoLook, auto marketers and remarketers will have access to a complete suite of industry-leading tools that delivers value in speed, scalability, and cost.”
Through the new partnership, Liquid Motors customers will be able to order verified, third-party condition reports that can be completed onsite at any time and in any location across the country.
Data and images captured by WeGoLook will be instantly leveraged within Liquid Motors’ platform, allowing users to easily market or remarket vehicles through any of Liquid Motors’ connected sites.
The company said the new integration allows data and images to be automatically listed across any number of supported websites for auction or sale.
Additionally, customers will be able to connect a Liquid Motors account with an associated WeGoLook account to facilitate ordering and delivery of inspections and condition reports on vehicles.
When an order for a condition report is placed via Liquid Motors platform, WeGoLook will immediately call for one of the company’s over 30,000 independent contractors called “Lookers” to visit the vehicle onsite to get the needed images and information using the WeGoLook mobile app.
“We’re very excited to bring on-demand vehicle inspections to the Liquid Motors platform and to improve efficiencies for auto remarketers everywhere,” said Robin Smith, CEO of WeGoLook. “I know that customers are going to be thrilled not only by the quality and consistency of our vehicle inspections but also with the speed and scale at which we can deliver them.”
Xtime announced Wednesday it has integrated its Xtime Engage product with Vantiv Integrated Paymen. This will provide dealerships with a payment process that allows customers to easily submit payments online or via tablets.
In addition to giving Xtime users access to menus, pricing and service history, dealers can now accept a wide range of payment types both in-store and online with the new integration.
“By meeting customers on their terms and valuing their time, dealers can instill satisfaction and loyalty and drive their revenue,” Xtime marketing and managed services division vice president Jim Roche said in a news release. “The checkout experience should leave a positive impression and not diminish, or ruin, an otherwise excellent service experience.”
Additionally, even Xtime software users who currently employ another company to process payments can access Vantiv’s integrated solution.
“We are very pleased to partner with Xtime to offer a flexible payment option that employs the highest standards in security and safety to the U.S. automotive industry,” added Matt Downs, head of channel and business development at Vantiv.
“This solution provides automotive dealerships with a new level of security by offering point-to-point encryption, as well as improving the consumer’s experience by offering a full suite of payment methods.”
The payment solution is PCI-compliant, when processing card transactions it utilizes encryption and tokenization to maintain the high-security standards, according to Xtime.
Donlen has added new telematics functionality to its DonlenDrive mobile app mobile app that provides fleet drivers with access to important vehicle documents and notifications.
DonlenDrive is now integrated with DriverPoint Telematics, which gives fleet drivers access to daily driving and vehicle health data received from telematics devices.
Prior to the added functionality delivered via the new integration, only fleet managers and supervisors were able to view daily driving and vehicle health data offered by Donlen’s DriverPoint Telematics software, according to Donlen.
“Once inside the app, drivers will be able to see how many trips they’ve taken, the number of hours they’ve spent driving, the number of miles they’ve driven within that month, as well as the location and time that unsafe driving behavior, such as harsh acceleration, deceleration or speeding has occurred,” Donlen director of telematics and safety products Tom Sloan said in a news release.
“Drivers will also be able to view critical areas of vehicle health such as odometer, tire pressure and oil level. Fleet managers and drivers will be provided visibility to the same telematics data points, so they can better work together towards decreasing risky driving behavior and improving fleet safety. We are excited that we continue to make our solution better than before.”
With DonlenDriver, drivers can access crucial information related to personal tax reporting, new vehicle ordering and company policy compliance.
Entrepreneur George Chamoun is driven by his desire to change the wholesale industry via technology as head of ACV Auctions.
After graduating from the University at Buffalo in 1997, the North Syracuse, N.Y., native would go on to launch technology and services company Synacor with his college roommate Darren Ascone, a year later.
Chamoun, an early angel investor in ACV, spent two decades leading Synacor as president of sales and marketing prior to joining ACV.
ACV Auctions’ recent procurement of $15 million in venture funding in a Series B investment from a Silicon Valley-based firm is is the largest the company has received since it began operations in 2014.
That $15 million in venture funding, which occurred not long after Chamoun became CEO, was led by Bessemer Venture Partners.
In September 2016, the company had announced that it both brought aboard Chamoun and raised $5 million in venture funding, led by Tribeca Venture Partners, with participation from SoftBank Capital NY, Armory Square Ventures and Rand Capital.
“It’s my job to lead the company to be a very success oriented company,” Chamoun said in an interview with Auto Remarketing. “We’re growing the business in a very, very exponential way — growing in hitting all of our goals and objectives that we’ve set for ourselves. We’re out there growing four new markets a month. We’re going strong from Buffalo all the way down to just now entering in Florida.”
“It’s helpful that I spent 20 years building a technology company where we utilized technology to change the way businesses and consumers operate. It started out with email many years ago. We were a company that operates email services, and back then that was a new service 20 years ago,” Chamoun explained.
When asked about the similarities between his prior and current role Chamoun said his commitment to growth as a leader remains the same.
“The commonality is that you’re hiring great people to build great technology, to service very important customers and changing the way the industry works and in a way adding value via technology and people, to help an industry grow and become better.”
ACV has continued to add markets this year and has plans to do even more expansion.
“We’re very core mission-driven, everything we do is about trust and transparency, so we’re leveraging technology and our people know the trusted and transparent platform,” Chamoun said. “ And we’ve got the capital partners and investors who all believe in our mission and funded our business to help us have the capital needed to grow at a rapid rate.”
In mid-October, Auto Remarketing recorded a podcast with Chamoun, which can be found below.
Automotive technology provider VINFactor has released a new saved cars feature that allows dealers to save vehicles across any website or software tool during the vehicle research and acquisition process.
Dealers using the recently launched VINFactor product can now click on any VIN on any website to activate the new car saving feature.
The company said this and other new product features are based on dealer feedback.
“This is the first time that a dealer can save any and every vehicle, no matter the website that they’re visiting,” VINFactor founder Steve Greenfield said in a news release. “We’ve listened to dealers who have been using VINFactor, and they’ve asked us for the ability to save cars as they use auction websites, their appraisal tool and even other dealership websites. Now they’ll be able to collect all of their saved vehicles in one easy to manage list that is always available in their browser.”
In addition to the new feature, the free product provides dealers with real-time actionable insights that are available inside the browser.
“Dealers have historically been challenged with a bunch of different software products that don’t work together,” added Greenfield. “VINFactor is the solution that bridges this gap between the various websites and software tools that a dealer uses, smoothing out their internal processes.”
Dealer Simplified has partnered with Dominion Dealer Solutions to give dealers using any of Dominion's customer relationship management tools access to its automotive auction solution, Auction Simplified, and wholesale buyers network.
Via a mobile auction app and desktop solution, Auction Simplified facilitates real-time live bidding from franchise dealers to wholesale buyers.
The auction service offers dealers a streamlined process that can increase wholesale profitability, according to Dealer Simplified.
“The unique feature of Auction Simplified that usually comes as a surprise to dealers is that it's essentially free to the franchise dealer. Other than a small initial set up fee, there are no sellers fees or monthly fees for the franchise dealer, and the buyer's fee is 200 percent lower than industry average,” Dealer Simplified co-founder and chief operating officer Kevin Leigh said in a news release.
Dominion's group of CRM tools include DealActivator, Autobase and Web Control.
JM&A Group recently introduced Dealer Source, its new application portal designed to speed up online transactions.
The new portal’s self-service capabilities can help dealers improve efficiencies and the customer experience, according to the company.
“Part of the value we bring to our dealers is in-store support for their day-to-day operations, and resources to increase their productivity,” said Gavin Tennant, vice president of customer services. “Dealer Source is an intuitive tool to further these efforts and streamline the processes our dealers already have in place.”
Dealer Source includes VIN scanning technology, contract entry, claim inquiry and invoice transaction history.
In addition to multiple browsers, the portal will enable complete functionality on any mobile device.
