Holden to launch Maven car sharing service in Adelaide

HOLDEN is launching hire cars for Uber drivers in Adelaide as the first step to an app-based car sharing scheme operating in the United States.

HOLDEN is launching hire cars for Uber drivers in Adelaide as the first step toward an app-based car sharing scheme operating in the United States.

Just 11 days before the Elizabeth car manufacturing plant’s shutdown, Holden will on Monday reveal the Adelaide launch of Maven Gig, offering weekly rentals to ride-hailing drivers across a range of vehicles.

The move is part of the Holden offering’s expansion beyond Melbourne and Sydney, where it has signed up more than 400 cars and 600 drivers in two months.

The Maven Gig service, also expanding to Brisbane and the Gold Coast, offers Uber and other ride-hailing drivers access to Holden Captiva, Trax, Barina and Astras from $215 per week.

Holden director strategy and urban mobility Anthony Riemann told The Advertiser the Maven scheme would be an important part of the company’s Australian future, after the Elizabeth plant shuts on October 20.

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Parent company GM declared itself at the forefront of redefining the future of personal mobility when it launched Maven in January last year in the United States, where an app-based car sharing service operates in 17 cities.

Drivers use a smartphone app to choose their car and pick-up location, unlock and start the vehicle, then register the end of the trip and pay through the app when returning it to the pick-up spot.

Fuel costs are included in the $US8 ($10.30) hourly or $US80 ($103) daily rate, while membership of the Maven City car sharing program is free.

Mr Riemann said the car sharing product had been running for about a year for Holden’s Melbourne employees, with a range of new vehicles, as part of a trial that was about to expand to business fleets and other customers.

He said Holden hoped to soon follow up the Maven Gig product with city-based car sharing like that operating in the US.

“We’re certainly playing in this new space, as a 150-year-old company in Australia traditionally selling cars, this has been a good learning curve for us,” Mr Riemann said.

“It’s clear that although ownership is still strong and will be for a long time, people are starting to look at these (car-sharing) solutions.”

Expanding Maven City in New York in May, GM said the company was “disrupting itself with the intention of leading in the share of miles driven, whether through traditional vehicle ownership, car sharing or ridesharing”.

The company argued Maven eliminated the need to own a car in New York, because residents no longer had to pay high insurance premiums and costly off-street parking when the vehicles sat idle for 95 per cent of the time.

As well as the City and Gig product arms, Maven also has a Home line. This involves car sharing pools for apartment blocks and other large residential communities.

Holden will shut the door on Australian car manufacturing when the Elizabeth plant closes, costing 944 jobs.

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