Daimler, BMW Car-Sharing Service To Leave North America

Bayerische Motoren Werke AG BAMXY and Daimler AG DDAIF is planning to end their joint venture car-sharing service, SHARE NOW, in North America to focus more on the European market, according to Reuters.

What Happened

SHARE NOW said on Wednesday they would end operations in Montreal, New York, Seattle, Washington, D.C., and Vancouver on Feb. 29.

The German car-sharing company will instead target the European market. The company will also discontinue operations in three major European cities, Florence, London, and Brussels, but will focus the other European cities.

“Moving forward, SHARE NOW will focus on the remaining 18 European cities. We, along with our shareholders, believe these markets show the clearest potential for profitable growth and mobility innovation,” said the company in a written statement.

Why It Matters

The car-sharing company cited “the volatile state of the global mobility landscape” and “the rising infrastructure complexities facing North American transportation” as the two main reasons for closing operations in North America.

SHARE NOW faced fierce competition in the U.S. from ride-sharing companies such as Uber Technologies Inc UBER and LYFT Inc LYFT.

One of SHARE NOW’s two partners, Car2Go, which is a subsidiary of Daimler AG, ended operations in Denver, Austin, Texas; Portland, Oregon; and Calgary, British Columbia in October.

The other partner DriveNow, which is owned by BMW, started operations in London in December 2014, but “had to face the hard reality that we could still not convince enough people to do so,” the company said in a statement announcing its exit from the UK market.