Daimler Financial Services heads for record year

Daimler Financial Services once again expects to achieve record business results in 2012. In the first ten months of the year, Daimler's financial services subsidiary posted all-time highs for new business and contract volume, and its operating profit (EBIT) rose above
€1-billion for the first time in the first three quarters. EBIT therefore surpassed even last year's all-time high, and the company expects it to rise to around €1.3-billion for the year as a whole.

"We are on course to set a new record, and we want to achieve strong growth even when the overall economy is weak," said Board of Management Chairman Klaus Entenmann.

On average, Daimler Financial Services finances or leases four out of ten Daimler vehicles worldwide. During the first ten months of the year, the company's new business (i.e. the value of all of the leasing and financing contracts concluded in 2012 to date) rose to the record value of €30.9-billion (+15 per cent). Contract volume, which is the value of all of the leasing and financing contracts managed by the company, also set a new record, amounting to €77.5-billion (+18 per cent) during the same period. In addition, Daimler Financial
Services brokered more insurance policies than ever before. In fact, the number of new contracts increased by 14 per cent to more than 860,000. Due to close collaboration with major insurance partners, Mercedes customers can benefit from customised insurance solutions which ensure that damaged automobiles are
repaired in authorized workshops by experts using genuine spare parts.

As part of its DFS 2020 strategy, Daimler Financial Services plans to continue to grow profitably in the coming years. "Until the end of the decade, we want to nearly double our worldwide contract volume compared to 2011," said Entenmann. Important growth drivers include the expansion of the company's business in Asia, the Daimler Group's product offensives and the increase in the range of innovative mobility services. The company expects to post especially strong growth in the Asia-Pacific region, where its new business rose by 23 per cent to €4.4-billion in the first ten months of 2012, compared to the same period last year. In August, the company became the first premium automobile manufacturer to offer leasing products in China. In addition, the company successfully launched its financing business in India for Daimler's new locally produced truck brand, BharatBenz. In November 2012, the company also kicked-off its financing business in Malaysia, which is an important southeast Asian market with more than 28-million inhabitants.

Daimler Financial Services is also set to grow in Europe and the Americas. In both regions, the company concluded substantially more new leasing and financing contracts through October than in past years. New business amounted to €14.9-billion (+13 per cent) in Europe and to €11.6-billion (+17 per cent) in the Americas. "We want to grow in our traditional core markets in the wake of Daimler's current product offensives," said Entenmann. With its new compact models, Daimler particularly wants to reach young customers, who are especially open to financing and leasing offers. For the new Mercedes-Benz A-class, for example, the company is offering target group-appropriate all-in-one packages that include financing, insurance and service.

Daimler Financial Services sees additional growth opportunities in the area of innovative mobility services. Its subsidiary car2go GmbH is now represented in 15 cities in Europe and North America. In addition, it has a total of over 220,000 customers, which is almost four times more than at the beginning of 2012. "We want to enable even more people to use car2go, which is why we plan to be represented in more than 50 cities by the middle of the decade," said Entenmann. A car2go vehicle is rented about every four-and-a-half seconds on average in the cities in which the service is provided. Over the long term, Daimler Financial Services also plans to offer additional innovative mobility services.

"We want to expand from a automotive financial services company to a provider of mobility services," Entenmann further added. "Ultimately, our imagination is not limited to car2go."

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