Volkswagen‘s financing division has introduced an online platform to grab a share of used vehicle sales in Germany, as it pursues a goal to nearly double its portfolio of credit, leasing and insurance contracts to 30 million units by 2025.
Volkswagen Financial Services stated it had produced a platform called HeyCar to list higher-margin preowned vehicles and target the capacity in Germany’s used-car market, where about 95 percent of online sales take place through the some of the major online platforms.
Some experts state Volkswagen is boosting its used-car sales strategy to counter falling residual values for diesel automobiles in Germany.
A June report by Schwacke, the German department of pricing data provider Autovista Group, revealed an increased preference for petrol-powered used cars, with total diesel residual values dipping below those of petrol this year.
Dahlheim stated the HeyCar launch “has definitely nothing to do” with falling diesel residual values.
Volkswagen Financial Services, which represented 14 percent of VW group’s 2016 operating earnings of 14.6 billion euros ($17 billion), deals with dealer and consumer financing and the German group’s banking and leasing business.
Its operations omit the Scania and Porsche brands and the Porsche Holding Salzburg supplier.
Introduced in early October, HeyCar currently lists 50,000 automobiles and aims to triple that number by next year. In time it is targeting as much as 300,000 listings, stated Christian Dahlheim, the division’s head of sales.
“We want to grow and use new customer segments,” Anthony Bandmann, chief executive of Volkswagen Leasing GmbH, informed reporters.
Unlike competing platforms, HeyCar, to be run by newly-created Mobility Trader GmbH, will be devoid of ads and will also be opened to non-VW brand name dealerships, stated Dahlheim.
Through its five main passenger-car brands VW, Audi, Porsche, Skoda and Seat, Volkswagen group represents about 40 percent of used-vehicle sales in Europe’s largest auto market.
