Bridgestone Europe buys TomTom Telematics in €910m mobility deal

Part of the Bridgestone Corporation tyre empire, Bridgestone Europe says the deal will speed up its “journey to becoming a mobility solutions leader in the region”.

Bridgestone is making fleet solutions a “strategic priority”. In a statement, the company said: “New social, economic and technological megatrends are pushing the pace of change in the automotive industry and the future of vehicles is connected, autonomous, shared and electric.”

Bridgestone has diversified from the rubber products for which it is best-known into data collection from sensors, data platforms and analytics.

It cites the “growing importance of fleets over individually-owned vehicles for transportation of people and goods” as the catalyst for the acquisition, suggesting that fleet owners require better tools to maximise productivity and minimise total cost of ownership.
Paolo Ferrari, CEO of Bridgestone EMEA, says: “We are now well-positioned in EMEA to accelerate our data-driven business, expand our fleet customer base and seize fast-growing, profitable opportunities in the automotive mobility industry.”

TomTom CEO Harold Goddijn said his company would continue to develop mapping products, “enabling faster map updates while lowering operational costs, paving the road towards autonomous driving”.

TomTom Telematics claims an installed user base of 860,000 vehicles, more than two-thirds of which are commercial. The company says it handles each day on average 800 million GPS positions, 3.3 million trips and 200 million inbound messages.