The worlds of Silicon Valley and the automotive industry are colliding and car dealers have a chance to benefit, according to John Possumato, Founder and CEO of DriveItAway. He is one of the featured speakers at the upcoming CADA Summit that will take place on February 13, 2019 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.
In an interview with Canadian auto dealer, Possumato discussed how dealers can profit from new businesses opportunities being born out of the Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) market — which includes ride sharing (Uber, Lyft) and car sharing services (ZipCar, DriveNow). More importantly, he says dealers can benefit from these developments now.
“All of these current rideshare businesses cannot operate without the dealer’s infrastructure, so by leveraging their need for new drivers and infrastructure, dealers can actually get into shared mobility,” said Possumato. “It (shared mobility) hits three criteria necessary for any dealer: it has to make money without demanding a significant amount of investment; it must be able to scale; and it has to feed the traditional side of the business — the vehicle sales and fixed operations.”
During his session at the CADA Summit, Possumato will explore how dealers can profit from the shared mobility market both directly with their own ride/car sharing offering, and indirectly through fixed operations to service fleets. He will also discuss how not taking advantage of these opportunities will impact auto retailers in the coming years.
“The dealers that get it will be in very firmly, and the dealers that don’t will be kind of left sitting there,” said Possumato.
Dealers interested in attending his session can register for the CADA Summit 2019 online.
Possumato will be joined by an all-star lineup of speakers that include Brendan Shanahan, President of the Toronto Maple Leafs, who will be headlining the event. For the full list of speakers, click here.
The CADA Summit is supported by an exclusive sponsorship from TD Auto Finance.
