Corporate car fleet management has long grappled with two significant challenges: high total costs of ownership and consistently low fleet utilization rates. These issues not only inflate expenses but also undermine overall cost efficiency. To remedy these challenges, Urban Connect has developed a state-of-the-art platform designed to tackle these challenges head-on, offering companies the following benefits:

• Ability to monetize fleets by making the fleets digitally sharable and opening usage for private purposes  

• Ability to increase utilization by making vehicles digitally sharable between user groups and employees.  

• Less administrative efforts via easy app-based use and automatic expense reports 

• Full control over the platform with the ability to customize the platform (e.g. build user groups) to optimize for emissions, costs, and administrative efforts 

Enabling the use of corporate vehicles for private purposes 

The platform enables companies to intelligently deploy a fleet of vehicles for both corporate and private use, benefiting businesses and their employees. Allowing employees to use corporate vehicles for personal trips creates a new revenue stream through usage fees. This not only offsets operational costs but can help fleet managers turn corporate fleets into potential profit centers. In general, companies price the usage of corporate cars for private purposes at between CHF 4-10 per hour, including all additional costs (charging and excess kilometers of up to 200km per day). In this way, employees get convenient, user-friendly access to a fleet of cars at very attractive prices.  

Beyond this immediate cost advantage, the solution generates far-reaching secondary benefits, which include: 

• Maximizing vehicle utilization: in traditional fleet setups, vehicles often remain idle for long periods. The Urban Connect sharing solution ensures higher utilization rates by making vehicles available for personal use during off-peak hours. This increased utilization maximizes the return on investment for fleet assets considerably. 

• Reducing the need for personal vehicles: the Urban Connect sharing solution reduces the necessity for employees to own personal vehicles, particularly in urban areas where parking and congestion are major issues. This promotes a culture of shared mobility, which in turn reduces the overall number of vehicles on the road, contributing to lower emissions and traffic congestion.  

• Tracking and analytics: the UC platform’s real-time reporting of vehicles ensures they are used efficiently and responsibly. As such, the telematics data can monitor usage patterns, enabling better planning and an improved allocation of vehicles​ in a fleet. The data can also assist in managing the transition to electric vehicles (EVs) by providing insights into the performance and efficiency of EVs compared to traditional internal combustion engine vehicles. This helps in making informed decisions about fleet composition and additional strategic decisions around emissions management.  

• Less bureaucracy through automated billing: the UC system can automate the billing segregation between business and private purposes, ensuring accurate and transparent accounting. This reduces administrative overhead, provides clear records of usage and charging allocation, and improves user satisfaction.  

Multiple examples demonstrate how companies enhance cost efficiency and boost overall employee engagement through such a system. 

Example 1:

Company A, a large pharma company, boosts employee satisfaction at near-zero costs. 

Company A deploys 30 shared e-cars for business and private purposes. The pricing structure is designed to be highly attractive for employees, offering rates of CHF 6 per daytime hour and CHF 2 per nighttime hour. This affordability encourages employees to take cars home for commuting purposes when working late or missing a public transport connection. 

Leveraging this attractive offering structure, Company A now enables over 1,500 monthly private rides through the corporate shared fleet, generating nearly CHF 30,000 in private revenue. In parallel, the centralized, full-service solution cuts overhead for the mobility team by around 10%. As a result, 76% of over CHF 40,000 in monthly fleet costs are effectively reduced for the company. 
 
In addition to strong financial contribution, employee benefits and engagement greatly improved. Over 7’000 employees registered, and over 550 employees share the 30 cars at least once per month, translating to an average of over 18 unique users per vehicle each month. In a survey conducted last year involving 407 employees, results revealed that the Urban Connect offering led 21% of respondents to forego private car ownership—either by selling their existing vehicles or delaying plans to purchase one. Additionally, the shared e-car fleet’s operating costs are predominantly offset by revenue generated from employees’ private use of the vehicles. This enables the corporate client to offer employees a highly valuable service at essentially break-even cost.  

Example 2:

Company B, a research facility, saves costs and operational effort by integrating their existing fleet onto the Urban Connect system. 

Company B already had an existing fleet of 22 corporate cars that they decided to integrate onto the Urban Connect platform. 

By integrating 22 vehicles onto the Urban Connect platform, company 2 seamlessly enabled their use for both private and business purposes with minimal administrative effort. This integration provided employees with a wide range of advanced features, including keyless access, a user-friendly booking application, an administrative platform, user groups for managing pricing and access rules, detailed fleet and emissions reporting, 24/7 customer service, and more. With a 96% positive ride rating, and on average 150 rides made per week, the integration has been highly successful.  

The private ride functionality alone generates close to CHF 2’500 in monthly revenue while the advanced fleet management functions additionally reduce overhead costs by up to 20%. Combined with savings from preventive maintenance and digital fleet monitoring, approximately 37% of the CHF 15,000 monthly fleet costs are now effectively offset. This remarkable cost optimization demonstrates how digital integration can transform a traditional corporate fleet into a cost-efficient, user-centric mobility solution.  

A new path for fleet management 

Urban Connect’s advanced telematics-based sharing platform revolutionizes fleet management, transforming it from a cost-intensive obligation into a strategic asset that drives meaningful value. By adopting these modern solutions, companies can unlock the full potential of their fleets, achieving reduced costs, enhanced operational efficiency, and a measurable reduction in corporate emissions—contributing to both business success and sustainability goals. 

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