Demand for financial services

We assume that automotive financial services will continue to grow in importance worldwide in 2015. We expect demand for financial services to increase more strongly in those emerging markets in which market penetration is currently low, such as China. In regions with developed automotive finance markets, there will be a further shift in the offering towards enabling mobility at a manageable total cost. This will see integrated end-to-end solutions, comprising service modules such as insurance and innovative packages of services, and new mobility offerings like carsharing becoming increasingly important. We also expect this trend to continue in the period 2016 to 2019.

We anticipate that demand for financial services in the mid-sized and heavy commercial vehicles segment will gain momentum in the emerging economies, especially where financing solutions support vehicle sales and are thus an essential component of the sales process. In the developed markets, we believe there will be greater demand for cost-optimized services in 2015, a trend that will likewise continue in the period 2016 to 2019.