Supported by Jean-Bernard Lafonta (HLD), Coyote diversifies its products and strengthens its presence in Europe


Thursday, September 15, Coyote opened a new store in Lyon. Proof of the current good form of the French driver assistance specialist, despite direct competition from Waze. Backed by Jean-Bernard Lafonta’s HLD investment fund, Coyote has been strengthening its presence in Europe for several years and diversifying its products.

On September 15, the French leader in community road information Coyote opened a new store in Lyon. It now has 13 in France, and around 30 in Europe. Founded in 2005, Coyote has succeeded in making a name for itself in the driving aids market, and has a turnover of 135 million euros for an operating profit of 50 million euros. Its valuation has even tripled in the space of ten years, to reach 500 million euros. Its historical activity, ie the driving assistance service provided via boxes (sold between 159 and 349 euros), currently represents 80% of its turnover.

Coyote therefore continues on its merry way, despite the omnipresence in this market of the giant Google and its subsidiary Waze. “Google saves drivers time, we save them money,” believes Benoît Lambert, the general manager of Coyote since 2015. This former senior executive at Sony France wanted to get the group out of its risky positioning. The strategy ? A product, a service, a country, a technology.

To develop his ambitious plan, Benoît Lambert can notably count on the support of the European investment fund HLD, which has owned 20% of the group’s capital for seven years. Led by Jean-Bernard Lafonta, HLD has made Coyote one of the nuggets in its portfolio with the aim of extending its services beyond the simple control of speed cameras, through the diversification of its products. HLD is also working to continue the development of the company in France and Belgium, and to strengthen its Europeanization in Italy, Spain and Germany.

The support of Jean-Bernard Lafonta’s fund is bearing fruit since the company now extends to Belgium, Italy, Spain and Portugal. 370 employees in these countries meet the needs of a community of more than 5 million users. In addition, Coyote deploys its diversifications everywhere. “We were focused on the general public, we are now a service platform”, indicates the DG.

Indeed, Coyote’s growth is based on three new businesses. At the end of 2017, the group acquired the geolocation specialist Traqueur. An operation that allows it to position itself as the European expert in the recovery of stolen vehicles. 150,000 anti-theft devices are installed each year. “We are also attacking the two-wheeler market and the activity should weigh 35% of our turnover within three years”, says Benoît Lambert.

Using Tracker technology, Coyote claims to recover 91% of stolen vehicles in less than 24 hours. And in 93% of cases, the vehicles are in good condition. The company is paid for the installation of boxes (between 100 and 200 euros) and on subscriptions.

This geolocation service is well matched with another diversification of the group: the management of company fleets. Thus, Coyote is positioning itself on the professional market and creating another source of regular income.

To continue to grow, the company now wants to exploit the mass of navigation data collected thanks to the millions of users of its service.. “A good part of our know-how lies in the real-time processing of information transmitted by our customers”, emphasizes the boss of Coyote. These anonymized data, which are now worth gold, are of course of interest to companies such as Vinci, Michelin or Here, the European specialist in online mapping, and competitor of Google.

If Coyote wants to compete with big data aggregators, however, it must continue to expand in Europe. Poland, Germany and the Netherlands are the next target countries.

Did you like this article ? Share it with your friends with the buttons below.





Facebook


LinkedIn


E-mail





Source link -85