Car rental firm Avis India plans to expand its fleet size in the next three years as it looks to increase its revenue to Rs 350 crore by 25 per cent this March 2017 .
The company, which has been providing service to hospitality sector and corporate clients, is also expanding its offering by adding self-drive car rentals in over 166 countries to their customers travelling for business or leisure from India.
“Our target is to clock Rs 350 crore in March 2017. We need to keep growing at twice the market rate and in the next three years after 2017 our aim is to have a revenue,” Avis India managing director and CEO Sunil Gupta told BW Businessworld.
When asked about expansion of the company’s fleet in order to meet the target, he said, “We keep adding cars. It will be around 8000 as compared to the current 6,000 cars both lease and rent a car.”
The car rental company has both self-drive and chauffeur driven options for the customer. It has only a fleet of hatchback cars with a range starting from Rs 15 to Rs 25 lakh and above.
Bullish on growing at a healthy rate, he said the entire car rental and hire sector has been growing at around 12 per cent and the company has been growing at 25 per cent. Their competitor in India is Zoom Car and Myles.
“We have been focussing on usage of technology and getting into new segments that has enabled us to grow at a healthy pace, we have apps which can be used anywhere in the world” Gupta said. Indians travelling abroad can use Avis’ self-drive car rentals in over 166 countries," Gupta added.
He said usage of satellite-based tracking system has helped in preventing wrong billing and that has made it completely transparent while dealing with the clients.
“Moreover, cars in our fleet are safety compliant and in some cases even ahead of safety regulatory requirements. As a result, our corporate clients, mostly the MNCs which are particular about these issues, continue to take our services for their employees,” he said.
The company plans to engage with travel agents, tour operator and travel management companies who have a strong focus on outbound travel.
Avis is an American car rental company headquartered in New Jersey, United States. Avis, Budget Rent a Car and Budget Truck Rental are all units of Avis Budget Group. It is a $ 8 billion company, Nasdaq listed firm.
Avis Budget Group operates the Avis brand in North America, South America, India, Australia and, New Zealand. Recently Avis has acquired Avis Europe plc which once was a separate corporation licensing the Avis brand. Avis is the third largest car rental agency in the world trailing behind Hertz Corporation.
