Avis Budget Group is rolling out 11,000 Peugeot, Citroën and DS vehicles to its connected car rental fleet in Europe by the end of this year.

Avis Budget Group is rolling out 11,000 Peugeot, Citroën and DS vehicles

The group has already put 6,000 vehicles of the total in service and the additional 5,000 cars are expected later this year.

The vehicles will operate across the company’s Avis and Budget brands in Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland and the UK as well as the Maggiore brand in Italy.

The rental giant plans to have more than 100,000 connected cars globally this year and has committed to operating a fully connected global fleet by 2020. Last month, the firm announced it had partnered with Toyota Motor Company to deploy 10,000 connected vehicles across the US in 2018.

As well as bringing benefits for fleets and drivers, the data from the connected cars is also used to streamline Avis Budget Group’s own operations.

“Leveraging the data from both connected cars and connected travellers enables us to achieve significant cost savings and margin improvements,” said Mark Servodidio, president, International, Avis Budget Group. “Better information, delivered automatically and in real-time eliminates or reduces many of the manual tasks provided by field personnel, resulting in a better customer experience, a more efficient workforce and better maintained vehicles.”