Speaker 1: The new service from General Motors that lets you rent
Speaker 1: out your own car to other people. Think Airbnb, but
Speaker 1: for your car.
Speaker 2: What's going on. I'm Rich Dmiro.
Speaker 1: This is Rich on Tech and joining me today is
Speaker 1: Akshay Jay Singh. He is Maven's West Coast regional manager,
Speaker 1: to talk about a new way to make some extra money.
Speaker 2: Akhay, welcome to the show.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Rich.
Speaker 1: So tell me about Maven. This is under GM's Maven brand.
Speaker 1: I've done stories with them before. This is sort of
Speaker 1: started out as kind of Maven's by the hour car
Speaker 1: sharing rental service, but now it's expanding to peer to
Speaker 1: peer and it's going to be coming to the city
Speaker 1: of Los Angeles by the end of the year. Tell
Speaker 1: me first off, what Maven's all about.
Speaker 3: Sure, you know, we are seeing a pretty strong growth
Speaker 3: in demand for access to cars, like through car sharing.
Speaker 3: We're also seeing a change in consumer behavior with the
Speaker 3: growth and right sharing, and one of them the key
Speaker 3: drivers is, you know, urban population growth is on the rise.
Speaker 3: Right especially millennials value the access to a car versus ownership,
Speaker 3: and that's really where Maeven comes in. We are a
Speaker 3: mobility as a service brand and in the last two
Speaker 3: years that we've been in LA. We have a Maven
Speaker 3: car sharing offering where we offer hourly rentals, you know,
Speaker 3: very teamless. You don't need to have the access to
Speaker 3: the keys. All you do is you download the Maven apps,
Speaker 3: sign up with us one time, and then you can
Speaker 3: see what cars are in your vicinity, walk up to
Speaker 3: the car the phone, access the key fob, and you
Speaker 3: get teamless access to a car loaded with technology. It's
Speaker 3: across our portfolio for Chevrolet, Buegg, GMC and Cadillac products,
Speaker 3: and that program is called as Navan Car Sharing, which
Speaker 3: has been doing great over the last two years. We
Speaker 3: also have a Maven Gig offering where we offer weekly
Speaker 3: rentals to write share and deliveried drivers, which has also
Speaker 3: been growing exponentially. So, you know, with all this experience,
Speaker 3: and you know, over three hundred and thirty million miles
Speaker 3: driven on the Mavan platform, close to two hundred thousand reservations,
Speaker 3: we've learnt a lot about customer preferences, and now what
Speaker 3: we're launching is called as Navan Peer and maybe in
Speaker 3: Peer allows any GM owner with a twenty fifteen model
Speaker 3: layer or newer car to place their own car on
Speaker 3: the Maven platform. To leverage a member base and to
Speaker 3: make some money on their personal asset.
Speaker 2: Okay, So and let me explain.
Speaker 1: So I know there's some people listening that are thinking, Okay, rich,
Speaker 1: this sounds crazy. Number One, I'm not going to rent
Speaker 1: out my own car. I don't want other people in it.
Speaker 2: Okay. So that's one concern.
Speaker 3: You know. The interesting aspect is ninety five percent of
Speaker 3: the time our cars are sitting idle. Right, Like, you
Speaker 3: use your car, and you obviously want it when you
Speaker 3: need it, like early in the morning. You know you've
Speaker 3: got to do school drop offs, you've got to go
Speaker 3: to work, pick up your kids, but there's that window
Speaker 3: of opportunity where your car is sitting idle. So the
Speaker 3: whole premise is that you know, as you think about it,
Speaker 3: and with the right technology and the member base that
Speaker 3: goes with it, you could potentially monetize your asset while
Speaker 3: you're not using it. You could still make sure that
Speaker 3: you block off the times when you need your own car,
Speaker 3: and then the car would not be available to a
Speaker 3: third party or to you know, another member to rent,
Speaker 3: but you could make it available depending on your schedule.
Speaker 3: So I would say it wouldn't work for everyone and
Speaker 3: every instance, like you mentioned the example in New Jersey,
Speaker 3: New York. You know, it potentially makes a lot of
Speaker 3: sense because you have public transit, you still want access
Speaker 3: to a car or a larger car on certain occasions.
Speaker 3: You know, if you're living somewhere in LA and you
Speaker 3: have one car and you know it's pretty highly utilized
Speaker 3: between your family, you could still look at certain windows
Speaker 3: of opportunity. So it's pretty as a platform that gives
Speaker 3: you that ability. Also, you know, we're trying to take
Speaker 3: out the risk from you as the owner because we
Speaker 3: offer or Maven offers the insurance for the duration of
Speaker 3: the rental up to a million dollars including collision damage
Speaker 3: as well as liability insurance. So you know, it's pretty
Speaker 3: much making it easier for you to put your car
Speaker 3: on the platform and try it out at a lower risk.
Speaker 1: Okay, So the cars that are eligible right now, you've
Speaker 1: got GM's for brands, so that's what you've got, Chevy,
Speaker 1: you've got Cadillac.
Speaker 2: What's the other two?
Speaker 3: Do it can GMC?
Speaker 1: Okay, So if you have one of those cars has
Speaker 1: to be a twenty fifteen or newer. Obviously, no manual transmission.
Speaker 1: I assume your car has to have on Star for
Speaker 1: this to work as well.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, and we actually offer on staff. So even if
Speaker 3: you had your own on Star account associated to your car,
Speaker 3: if you plan to list it on Mave and Peer,
Speaker 3: what were do is we would actually this enroll the
Speaker 3: car from your personal account and add it onto the
Speaker 3: Mavene account because on Star is a key enabler for
Speaker 3: this technology.
Speaker 1: To work, right, because that gives you the cellular connection
Speaker 1: which allows people to find your car the GPS tracking
Speaker 1: also unlock it and then also when they're in your car,
Speaker 1: they get use of your your hot spot as well.
Speaker 3: Huh correct, So that's one of the other reasons that
Speaker 3: we enroll the car onto the maven account because we
Speaker 3: do offer pogsd Wi Fi as standard across you know,
Speaker 3: every maven car on the platform.
Speaker 1: So is there anything I need to install in my car?
Speaker 1: If let's say I have, you know, a twenty sixteen
Speaker 1: Chevy Cruise with on Start, Do I need anything extra
Speaker 1: to install on there?
Speaker 3: Yes?
Speaker 1: You do.
Speaker 3: So the way the process works is, you know, any
Speaker 3: member who's interested in listing their car on Mave and
Speaker 3: Peel would go to our website. They'll fill out a
Speaker 3: quick form, you know, just informing us pretty much what
Speaker 3: you said, like, Hey, this is the modelayer, this is
Speaker 3: the wind details. We'll do a quick check on our
Speaker 3: end to ensure that the product is compatible, and then
Speaker 3: a mave an onboarding mentor actually calls the interested person
Speaker 3: and explains the program a little bit more in detail,
Speaker 3: and then we schedule an appointment with a technician from
Speaker 3: our team who will come down pick up the car,
Speaker 3: and we install a specific gadget to the vehicle that
Speaker 3: allows this keyless access to your car. There are certain
Speaker 3: models that are not compatible with keyless access, but we
Speaker 3: do have a solution for that as well.
Speaker 2: And does that cost me anything.
Speaker 3: Currently nothing, So it's it's pretty low risk. You know,
Speaker 3: we are bearing the initial upfront costs for the technology
Speaker 3: that enables the seamless access.
Speaker 1: Okay, so if I live in apartment building in let's
Speaker 1: say Santa Monica West, Los Angeles, one of these crowded areas,
Speaker 1: and I can get to work let's say, on a
Speaker 1: I don't know, on a scooter and my car sits
Speaker 1: at my place a day. I mean, it's really kind
Speaker 1: of worth it to try this out, if you don't
Speaker 1: mind the idea of being part of the sharing economy.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, yep, that would be a great use case. Right,
Speaker 3: you still want your car for weekend trips or you
Speaker 3: know what have you, you know, the occasional running of errands,
Speaker 3: but your car sitting idle for most of the time,
Speaker 3: then that would be a perfect candidate, you know, to
Speaker 3: try it out. Like I mentioned, you know, we install
Speaker 3: the technology, we enroll your carn on Star. You can
Speaker 3: decide what time of day you want to make the
Speaker 3: car available for public use and try it out.
Speaker 1: So I get to set my own rate, but obviously
Speaker 1: you're going to help me with some suggested rates. So
Speaker 1: if it's a sort of a compact or standard car
Speaker 1: like a Chevy Cruz seven twenty five an hour, eighty
Speaker 1: dollars a day, a pickup truck fourteen to fifteen hour,
Speaker 1: one hundred and forty five a day, a Camaro which
Speaker 1: is sort of a high end car nice car twenty
Speaker 1: two to fifteen hour or two twenty five a day,
Speaker 1: how much can I make renting my car? And what's
Speaker 1: kind of the profit split here between me and Maven?
Speaker 3: Right, so the owner makes a majority of the revenue,
Speaker 3: Maven still keeps us small percentage just because you know,
Speaker 3: we offer the insurance, the technology, and the service. It's
Speaker 3: a sixty forty split, so the owner keeps sixty percent
Speaker 3: of all revenue and Mayven takes forty percent. And in
Speaker 3: terms of, you know, just the overall experience, you know,
Speaker 3: we install the tech and ensure that you know, the
Speaker 3: car is good to go, we'll test it with you
Speaker 3: before it's on the platform.
Speaker 1: And what's been the response to this and the other cities.
Speaker 1: Have people been signing up to use it? And do
Speaker 1: people like it on both ends?
Speaker 3: You know? And we launched a data in Detroit initially
Speaker 3: and the response was overwhelmingly positive. In fact, we're pleasantly
Speaker 3: surprised by the number of hand raisers we got so early.
Speaker 3: It's still early days, but we are very encouraged by
Speaker 3: the success of the program so far. Like you mentioned,
Speaker 3: you know, there's a lot of people who own you know,
Speaker 3: the premium cars like a a Carvette, like a Camaro,
Speaker 3: and they really value that possession, but they also realize that, hey,
Speaker 3: it's sitting idle for more than ninety five percent of
Speaker 3: the time. Could I rent it out and make some money?
Speaker 3: And so we do have some exciting you know products
Speaker 3: getting added to the platform, and also, you know, kind
Speaker 3: of expanding our geographical footprint from just the downtown core
Speaker 3: to some of the surrounding neighborhoods in Detroit, and I
Speaker 3: see a similar I hope to see a similar pattern
Speaker 3: in LA as well.
Speaker 1: Are we seeing a paradigm shift when it comes to
Speaker 1: car ownership. I mean, you know, we've seen obviously these
Speaker 1: ride sharing services you know, take effect. We've seen the scooters,
Speaker 1: We've seen the last mile issue being tackled in a
Speaker 1: lot of major cities public transportation, people living closer to
Speaker 1: where they work sometimes. So are we in the middle
Speaker 1: of a paradigm shift now that people are comfortable with
Speaker 1: the idea of renting out their own car to other folks.
Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely, I think you know, there's it's obviously, and
Speaker 3: it depends on every you know, region. We see it
Speaker 3: more in the dense urban areas where you have a
Speaker 3: lot of options, like if you have public transit, you know,
Speaker 3: you have ride sharing, you have the scooters. People are rethinking,
Speaker 3: you know, car ownership, right, They're they're thinking about should
Speaker 3: I really be paying you know, the lease for the
Speaker 3: car plus four hundred dollars to park it in a
Speaker 3: downtown garage, you know, because you just add up that
Speaker 3: and it's about eight nine hundred dollars a month, even
Speaker 3: if you never drive the car. Right, So, where in
Speaker 3: areas where you have a lot of different options, people
Speaker 3: are beginning to think about do I really need to
Speaker 3: own a car or can I get access to it?
Speaker 3: Now if you live in a suburban area, you know,
Speaker 3: the dynamics are different. But I think people are still
Speaker 3: rethinking can they move from a two car household to
Speaker 3: maybe a one car household. So it's a slow shift
Speaker 3: and it's going to take some time, but you know,
Speaker 3: it's definitely trending in a direction which will which I
Speaker 3: believe will help us all because you know, congestion is
Speaker 3: a huge issue, right, so as we have more shared
Speaker 3: assets and you know shared shared cause we know that
Speaker 3: from cars sharing, one check car on the road takes
Speaker 3: ten cars off the road. So that's really something that
Speaker 3: we're trying to address and also reduce congestion with this program.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I had some family in town and it was
Speaker 1: a weekend. We wanted to go up to Wine Country
Speaker 1: and all I wanted was a Chevy Tahoe in the
Speaker 1: fastest possible way. I could acquire one, and it was
Speaker 1: amazing to me. I knew about Maven, and you know,
Speaker 1: I live kind of in the suburban area, and so
Speaker 1: I was just literally looking at every app, every you know,
Speaker 1: even the major rental car companies, to try to find
Speaker 1: one of these things closest to me on demand. And
Speaker 1: even though I live in a neighborhood, let's say my
Speaker 1: neighbor decides to rent out their car. I mean in
Speaker 1: the future, that's not unforeseen, so I may be able
Speaker 1: to walk five houses down and get the rental car
Speaker 1: I need thanks to a program like this. It really
Speaker 1: is interesting when you think about the potential of this
Speaker 1: sort of program. If people are comfortable with it and
Speaker 1: they get on board, it does have the ability to
Speaker 1: change kind of the dynamics of things.
Speaker 3: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Akshay Jay Singh, Maven's West Coast regional manager, thanks for
Speaker 1: joining me today on the podcast.
Speaker 2: I appreciate it.
Speaker 3: Thanks.
Speaker 2: There you have it.
Speaker 1: If you need more information on Maven, you can go
Speaker 1: to their website it's maven dot com, or check the
Speaker 1: show notes, or you can always go to my website
Speaker 1: for the link. It's rich on tech dot TV. Thanks
Speaker 1: so much for listening to the podcast. I'm Richdmiro.
Speaker 2: I'll talk to you real soon.