Remember GM’s Maven? It’s a car rental service where for a free, users can borrow a loaded GM vehicle for up to 28 days at a time. While GM is running Maven, the company is looking to expand the service. According to Bloomberg, GM will do a pilot program this summer that will allow them to rent out their vehicles for personal use through Maven.
The program would apparently be only open to GM owners, and the company would take a piece of the revenue. This is basically like Airbnb for cars. There are other startups like Turo and Getaround that exist in this area, there are currently no existing companies that have the resources or reach like GM does. Another advantage that GM has is the wide owner base it can use to lure customers into the program.
Because of the success of Maven, it makes sense that GM is looking to expand the program. Rather than using its own fleet of cars, Maven would bring in current car owners, GM would have access to many more vehicles without having to own and maintain them. It’s a program that could potentially work well for GM, if all pieces fall in the right place.