Enterprise Holdings said it will create the Enterprise Car Share brand by the end of the year, combining the recently acquired Mint Cars On-Demand with its existing WeCar and PhillyCarShare units.
“We have been anticipating and meeting local transportation needs for more than 55 years, so underscoring car sharing’s connection to the Enterprise name and legacy makes perfect sense,” said Ryan Johnson, assistant vice president for Enterprise Holdings.
The car-sharing industry is expected to expand rapidly during the next few years. In a 2010 report, research firm Frost & Sullivan said North America car-sharing revenue would jump more than tenfold to $3.3 billion in 2016 from $253 million in 2009.
Frost & Sullivan added that the number of car-sharing members in North America would more than double between 2012 and 2016, to more than 4 million members.
Such growth prospects have attracted traditional car rental companies. Enterprise started a pilot car-sharing program in 2007, debuted its WeCar car-sharing unit in 2008 and acquired PhillyCarShare last year.
Hertz Global Holdings launched its Connect by Hertz car-sharing service in New York, London and Paris in late 2008, and has operations in more than 50 U.S. cities and universities.
Mint Cars On-Demand, founded in 2008, has more than 8,000 subscribers and 32 locations in the New York area and 13 in the Boston area. The company charges members $40 a year as well as driving rates of $7 an hour and $75 a day.
Car-sharing customers usually pay an annual fee, make an online reservation, swipe their membership card over a car-window sensor for access and drive a car for a predetermined rate.
The U.S. leader in the car-sharing business is Zipcar, which was founded in 1999 and went public last April with a $174.3 million IPO.
Last month, Zipcar said that its first-quarter revenue rose 20% to $59.1 million, while its number of subscribers jumped 23% to more than 709,000.
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