Many of the nation's major public dealership groups said last month that their digital auto sales are continuing to improve. Some dealers sell thousands of vehicles through their own branded platforms, while others roll out new tools to customers. Over 800 auto dealers have agreed to use GM's CarBravo platform to list used vehicles of all brands on their site, according to Vice President Steve Carlisle of General Motors North America.
Clicklane, part of Asbury Automotive Group Inc., said its tool handled more than 5,600 vehicle sales and online transactions in the first three months of this year - with March being its best month.
Group 1 Automotive Inc. reported during its first-quarter earnings call that it sold 5,800 cars in the United States through its e commerce AcceleRide platform from January through March, a total of 9.6 percent of the company's total sales.
In the U.S., Penske is rolling out a new online-buying platform for its seven storefronts. Penske collaborated on the Esntial Commerce technology platform with Cox Automotive, a dealership technology company that expects to market it as a white-label product to dealership groups other than Penske starting this fall.
The Esntial Commerce platform uses artificial intelligence to automate and power Penske's CarShop digital platform, and it can be accessible via the CarShop website's "purchase online" link located in the header. According to the corporations, the technology can help consumers buy a car digitally, from research, to documentation and finally, delivery.
According to UBS, by 2030, tens of millions of customers will order a car without even visiting a dealership, with many not ever seeing the vehicle. Consumers have become more open to the notion as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the report, while new technology and the energy transition will make it easier to make significant purchases like a car online without difficulty and give customers easy access to an easy buying process.
The digital transformation of business models in the auto industry is being rapidly accelerated at an unprecedented rate. The future of the car buying process is right around the corner, with the new digital age for purchasing new and used cars on the distant horizon.
KAR Global CEO Peter Kelly wants to trade off the in-person selling of ADESA U.S. operations, foregoing the typical brick and mortar business models, to Carvana in exchange for an infusion of $2.2 billion and the chance to expand its online auction offering.
The move will spotlight KAR's platforms, such as Carwave, an online business that dealers can use to view live auctions of trade-in vehicles, shifting to a digital business model for vehicle purchases on the wholesale side of the auto industry.
Here's an excerpt from Zach Hallowell, senior vice president of Manheim Digital's article, "At Manheim, we took a 360 approach to improve the client experience and accomplished many important goals around new policies to support digital buying and selling, as well as improving condition reports and vehicle imaging. Even with safely re-opening many of our locations for in-person sales, we ended the year with 81% of all sales in 2020 going to digital buyers (up from 48% in 2019!)."
Manheim, in a push to go digital, has acquired the AI company Fyusion to help create a more efficient way to process vehicles and create condition reports by scanning the vehicles. With more accurate data, participating dealers are able to make better purchasing decisions when trying to acquire more inventory, leading to happy customers and a better vehicle purchase process.