Mutua Madrileña continues with its business diversification strategy beyond insurance activity and enters carsharing. The company announced this Wednesday the launch of Voltio, as of December 15, which will have 500 electric cars in Madrid in rental service by the minute. As they are electric vehicles, they will be able to circulate without restrictions throughout the capital and park for free in the SER zone (regulated parking service). In addition, they will have exclusive parking spaces.
The option to rent electric cars will have a rate of 30 cents per minute in operation and 15 cents when paused. To access the car it will be necessary to have a mobile application, which will also serve as a key for the user. The service is designed to move over small distances, as other companies in the capital already do (Zity, Wible and Emov, among other options).
Mutua is thus committed to urban mobility with a fleet that will be made up of 400 Fiat 500e and another 100 Opel Corsa-e cars in its first phase. In other words, they leave the door open to increase the number of vehicles in the city. At the launch, according to the company in a statement, there will be a 50% promotional rate from December 15 to January 31: the price per minute with the vehicle running will be 15 cents.
“The goal is for our customers to be able to cover all their needs when traveling: from insuring their own car to offering services by the minute, day, week or month. In addition, with this new project, Mutua reinforces its commitment to sustainable urban mobility and non-polluting transport models”, says Víctor Zambrana, Deputy General Director of Insurance and New Businesses at Mutua Madrileña.
Voltio is the name of the platform, but it is also a semantic game that alludes both to the unit of electrical potential and to the way in which any Spaniard could communicate to another his intention to go for a walk: “take a volt”. The Madrid insurer calculates that the use of these electric cars will save emissions for the next three years of 1,500 tons of carbon dioxide.
The business of urban mobility
According to Conrado Espí, Mutua Madrileña’s deputy deputy general manager for Mobility, the company’s entry into the urban mobility business responds to “the increasing need of citizens to move over small distances in a simple and agile way”.
The company has been expanding its business towards mobility with investments in Centauro (rental vehicles), Chipi (digital mobility comparator), El Parking and Imbric (urban mobility platforms), NIW (digital vehicle purchase platform) and the popular platform of transport vehicles with driver, Cabify. Since last June, the group has owned a 1.26% stake in the VTC company.
The insurer, in its statement, maintains that this step follows the path of seeking new operations that “generate growth opportunities, adjacent to insurance, and that guarantee the stable and sustained development of the company.” Mutua has been very active in recent years in entering other businesses and expanding its space within insurance. For example, it took over 8% of El Corte Inglés for 555 million, in addition to acquiring half of the department store insurance division for another 550 million. Another example of the firm’s success in improving its activity is the alliance with SegurCaixa Adeslas, from CaixaBank (integrated into the Mutua group and 49.9% owned by CaixaBank).
