A Nikkei Shimbun article from April 15, 2018 caught my eye:
Car sharing war heats up: Nissan enters, Toyota forms new company
Car sharing — owning access to a car without owning it — is reaching a critical juncture for full-scale adoption. The number of users reached 1.08 million in 2017, doubling in three years. The number of vehicles exceeds 20,000, centered on urban areas, and is expected to grow by another 40% over the next two years.
One product holds over 80% of those 1.08 million users. That product is Times Car Plus.
I've personally been a heavy Times Car Plus user for over two years, and it's one of my favorite products — so I wanted to write about it.
Upfront: if any of the following use cases match you, Times Car Plus is worth recommending.
- You want to use a car for half a day on weekends
- You want a car at your travel destination
- You live downtown, don't want to maintain a car, but use one with reasonable frequency
This post draws on Park24 Group's FY2017 financial results materials and my own experience to cover Times Car Plus's overview, market share, strategy, and UX. If any of the above resonated with you, please read on.
What is Park24 Group?
Founded in 1997. Has grown primarily through its parking business. You'll often see "Times" branded coin parking lots around town. Starting from parking, they entered car rental in 2009 and car sharing in 2011 — the business I'm focusing on here.
Steady "Parking" + The Next Pillar: "Mobility"
FY2017 revenue was 232.9 billion yen (+19.8% YoY), continuing steady growth (operating profit decreased due to investment phase). Park24's business is a model that builds revenue on physical assets — land and vehicles — and as long as the value of "land and cars" doesn't rapidly erode, it's a B/S-type company that should continue performing steadily.
The standout within the group is the Mobility (= car rental and car sharing) business. Especially Times Car Plus — the car sharing business — shows massive investment and rapid growth.
The operating margin for the car sharing business alone exceeds 15% — an extraordinary figure comparable to internet media margins.
Estimated 80%+ dominant market share
In Japan's B2C car sharing market, Times Car Plus faces Orix's Orix Car Share and Mitsui Fudosan Realty's Careco as the main competitors (there are about 10 others, but these three dominate).
Among them, Orix started car sharing in 2002 per their February 2017 press release — quite a pioneering challenge at the time (though it seems they've only recently started putting real energy into it).
I compiled the latest available data from each company's public materials. Note that Orix and Mitsui only partially disclose key metrics for their car sharing segments; I referenced the Eco-Mobility Foundation 2017 survey. Revenue estimates assume a monthly revenue per vehicle similar to Times Car Plus.
By vehicle count, the current market share estimate is approximately 82%. Despite being a later entrant, Times used existing business assets to leap immediately to the top.
My estimated FY2017 market size for car sharing is approximately 28 billion yen. Led by Times Car Plus growing 20–30% YoY, the market should continue expanding.
Looking at car sharing as a business: "How well can you place vehicles proportional to population density, and how high can you drive per-vehicle revenue (increasing utilization rate and reducing maintenance costs)?" That's the core competition.
The first bottleneck is "parking space to place vehicles."
Park24, with its long track record and dominant share in parking, holds approximately 18,255 spaces nationwide. Currently 55% of these come with car sharing. It's not necessarily worth converting all of them, but numerically there seems to be plenty of room for further expansion.
Times Car Plus UX
I've personally tested Orix, Careco, and DeNA's peer-to-peer car rental service Anyca.
Currently I use only Times Car Plus, 1–2 times per week. Among all these services, Times Car Plus has overwhelmingly the best total UX — from finding a car online through returning it. Let me break down the elements.
Overwhelming station count
As the comparison above shows, Times Car Plus has more than 6x the vehicles and stations of its competitors — utterly dominant market share.
The fact that you can use it anywhere — near home, near the office, at casual destinations, at travel destinations — is the overwhelming strength of Times Car Plus's UX. When I went to Sendai, there were stations everywhere — even more than in Tokyo — and it was incredibly convenient.
Using a familiar car with the same equipment you're used to, found instantly on your phone at an unfamiliar travel destination — that's a genuinely new and great experience.
Mobile app with 2-tap reservation
Times' mobile app "Quick Search" shows available vehicles on a map for your desired time window. Of course you can filter by location, time, capacity, and vehicle type. The UI that intuitively shows how far away each station is from your current location is very usable.
times_ui
Reserving a vehicle takes just:
- Select vehicle on map
- Confirm on confirmation screen
Two taps total. Whether looking for "a car available right now" on demand or "locking in a car for the weekend," the low barrier to reservation keeps you coming back (you can specify reservation start time as early as 15 minutes out).
The app also gets regular updates — pages that were previously WebView have been nativized, indicating genuine investment in digital UX.
Carefully designed "in-vehicle experience"
times_ux
Times Car Plus charges "monthly fee + 206 yen per 15 minutes and up." The 1,030 yen monthly fee applies directly as free usage credit — meaning about 75 minutes of usage is covered by the monthly fee. Unlike car rental, not having to think about gas or insurance is a good experience.
All vehicles also come with a credit card for fueling. If you gas up or wash the car during your booking using that card, you get a discount on usage time. Having a booster seat available for children 3 years and older is also appreciated for families.
times_ux2
Times' Growth Strategy
Finally, let me read Times' growth strategy from their IR materials.
- Increase revenue per vehicle
- Suppress maintenance costs (avoid accidents, reduce CS burden)
- Ha:mo one-way service
Increase revenue per vehicle
The biggest opportunity cost in rental or sharing is idle time. Since Times is rapidly increasing vehicle count by 20%+ YoY, they must simultaneously work hard on reducing idle time — otherwise costs will balloon without matching revenue.
What Times is investing heavily in is growing corporate accounts that fill weekday utilization. Already nearly 40% of all accounts are corporate, and they're executing strategies to reduce weekday idle time.
times_storategy
Additional strategies to increase general usage time:
- Send traffic partnerships: partner with facilities reachable by car to issue Times-specific coupons
- Night packs: discounts during times when vehicles are most idle
Suppressing maintenance costs
The worst thing that increases idle time is accidents. Times is actively investing in accident prevention — all vehicles have backup monitors.
times_storategy2
In 2017 they also introduced 1,000 Nissan "Note" vehicles equipped with Around View Monitor.
Around View Monitor displays a bird's-eye view of the surroundings during parking. It also detects moving objects around the vehicle and alerts the driver through the display and sound, supporting the driver in always being able to drive with confidence.
By widely deploying high-function equipment, they can unify the experience for users and reduce human error rates across the board.
Their self-help pages are well-developed to reduce calls to customer support — steadily reducing per-vehicle costs.
times_storategy3
Ha:mo one-way service
One-way service (dropping off at a different location) is one of the things I'm most hoping for from car sharing. Proof-of-concept experiments for one-way service are underway, centered on the Tokyo metropolitan area.
An experiment with Toyota Motor Corporation ongoing since April 2015. Verifying the utility of a one-way trip (drop-off type) sharing service using ultra-compact EVs, with stations set up primarily in central Tokyo.
times_storategy4
If "you can drop off at any Times parking lot, and if the nearest one is full, the nearest available lot is suggested" — that would enable, for example, taking the train one way and coming home loaded with groceries by car.
Summary
Here I've looked at Times Car Plus from both the IR and UX angles.
Currently, for cases like "reservations of 12 hours or more," other services or rental cars may be cheaper. But as the car sharing market expands, that should change. Times, with its dominant share, will likely ultimately demonstrate competitive advantage on both cost and UX dimensions.
Times is genuinely optimized down to fine details — from mobile app reservation to the offline usage experience. There's a lot to learn from this UX, and I encourage many people to try the service.
