Few of its own buses, a strong software platform – whether the Flixmobility recipe for success will also work in the USA remains to be seen.
(Photo: dpa)
What a coup: Flixbus mother Flixmobility buys Greyhound. Almost everyone knows the bus operator from the USA, the buses with the greyhound as their logo were featured in numerous films.
So far so good. One question, however, arises: Why does a company that has previously made it a point not to own and drive the buses itself suddenly buy a vehicle fleet after all? In addition, one that is handsome with over 1000 buses and drivers.
In fact, Flixmobility is taking a certain risk with the transaction. Fines are assets that initially weigh on the balance sheet. The drivers, in turn, drive the personnel costs. Even if the management of Flixmobility shrinks the Greyhound fleet over the years, the so-called “asset-light strategy” will be softened a bit for the time being.
Because such a conversion has to be done carefully and will take time. After all, the brand promise of the young German company stands with the two brands Flixbus and Flixtrain: mobility that is affordable for everyone, but with good quality. Great internal unrest at Greyhound, and possibly over a longer period of time, would be pure poison for the plans of the young German entrepreneurs.
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At the same time, Flixmobility has a lot of leverage to master precisely this challenge. It’s the technology platform. It is infinitely scalable. Adding new offers there is a manageable effort. Even other means of transport such as Flixtrain trains can be lifted onto this platform relatively quickly. The same will now happen in the USA.
Car rental company Sixt follows a similar principle
The car rental company Sixt also works according to this principle. Erich Sixt describes his empire as an IT company with an attached car rental company. Once the IT is in place, an unlimited number of cars can be marketed via the platform – as is currently also happening in the USA. This not only enables rapid growth. The more products or services run on such a platform, the more profitable the business becomes.
First of all, the strong expansion in the USA may cost money because the companies are making advance payments. But they can quickly turn the start-up losses into substantial profits via their platforms.
The big Internet companies from the USA have been doing nothing else in foreign markets for years. It is good to see that it also works in the other direction, that German companies are also able to stir up established US markets using intelligent technology.
More: Flixbus buys the largest bus operator in the USA and becomes the market leader.