The Hertz Corporation

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Hertz Global Holdings, Inc.

logo
legal form Inc.
ISIN US42806J1060
founding 1918
Seat Estero , Florida , United States
management Paul Stone
Number of employees 38,000 (early 2020)
sales 9.8 billion US dollars (2019)
Branch Car rental
Website www.hertz.com
Status: February 24, 2020

The Hertz Corporation is a US company and, with 7900 stations, the world's largest in the rental car segment.

history

Logo replaced in 2009
Hertz station in Livonia (Michigan)
Hertz Station on Martha's Vineyard Island

In 1918, Walter L. Jacobs began renting out repaired used cars. The company expanded and had annual sales of US $ 1 million in the early 1920s. In 1923 Jacobs sold the company to John D. Hertz , but stayed with the company. John Hertz was also President of the Yellow Cab Company and its subsidiaries, Yellow Cab Manufacturing Company and Yellow Coach Manufacturing Company . The company was soon called "Hertz Drive-Ur-Self System" (in German: "Hertz-Fahr-Selbst-System") and was acquired by General Motors in 1926 as part of the acquisition of Yellow Cab / Coach. In 1953 the Omnibus Corporation bought the company; a year later it was renamed "The Hertz Corporation" and went public. In 1953, the New York truck leasing company Metropolitan Distributors was taken over by Hertz. The RCA acquired Hertz in 1967, but the company on its own initiative on.

In 1970 the reservation center was opened in Oklahoma City ; Hertz was now available around the clock. In the following years the ownership changed repeatedly: In 1985 Hertz was bought by United Airlines , 1987 sold to the "Park Ridge Corporation". Park Ridge Corporation was invested in part of the Hertz management team and Ford Motor Company . The Volvo North America Corporation invested in 1988 also in Park Ridge.

1982 was founded with the Penske Corporation , the joint venture Hertz Penske Truck Leasing .

The expansion to Japan took place in 1990 in the form of a joint venture with Mazda , which operated over 400 stations. 1993 merged Park Ridge and Hertz, the name "The Hertz Corporation" remained. Hertz has been listed on the stock exchange since 1997. In the same year the European reservation center opened in Dublin .

In 2000 the second reservation center opened in the USA. The following year Ford bought the remaining 18.5% of Hertz's shares. Hertz was now a wholly owned subsidiary of Ford.

In September 2005, the sale of Hertz to a group of investors ( Clayton Dubilier & Rice , The Carlyle Group and Merrill Lynch Global Private Equity ) for US $ 15 billion was announced. The transaction closed on December 22, 2005.

Hertz has been listed again since November 2006.

Hertz is one of the ranking by Interbrand today among the 100 most valuable brands in the world.

The parent company Hertz Global Holdings reached an agreement at the end of April 2010 to take over the competitor Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group for around 1.17 billion US dollars or 41 US dollars per share. The acquisition is expected to result in savings of at least $ 180 million and increase Hertz's profits. After the acquisition of Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group, the company had to sell Advantage Rent a Car . Then the new subsidiary Firefly was founded in 2013 .

In February 2019, Hertz launched a heli- skiing offer together with Air Zermatt . The offer includes, among other things, the rental of a luxury sport utility vehicle from Hertz for 24 hours and a flight with an Air Zermatt helicopter from Raron airport to one of the surrounding ski areas.

On 23 May 2020, the US parent company as a result of declines in sales by the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States the same place a bankruptcy petition for Chapter 11 provided. Hertz Global Holdings' subsidiaries in the United States and Canada have also filed for bankruptcy. The subsidiaries in Europe, Australia and New Zealand are not affected.

various

The German headquarters (head office) is in Eschborn (Ludwig-Erhard-Str. 12). This owner's address is entered in the German vehicle registration documents. Almost all vehicles have been registered in Düren since mid-2006 . Hertz vehicles can be recognized by their license plates with the format DN-Hx xxxx and DN-Ax xxxx . There is a barcode to the left and right of the rear windows. Before 2006 the vehicles were mainly registered in Wiesbaden . There are also a few vehicles with other registrations in the fleet (“Local Fleet”).

Hertz Autovermietung GmbH has a fleet of Ford models for long-term rentals ( Ford Fiesta , Focus , Mondeo and Kuga ). These are approved with the identification DN-LZ xxxx .

Neverlost

In the 1990s, Hertz developed the Neverlost GPS navigation system (in German “never lost”) and uses it in part of its fleet. Even then, it had features such as an LC display, voice output and address search. Neverlost was later modified and launched as the “ Magellan Roadmate GPS Navigation System” by the Thales Group . In 2009, the Magellan devices were replaced by easier-to-use Garmin devices.

literature

  • Harold Bierman: Case Studies for Corporate Finance: From A (Anheuser) to Z (Zyps) (= Volume 1: Case Studies ). World Scientific, New Jersey 2017, ISBN 9789814667012 , pp. 574-579 (= Hertz (2006) ).

Web links

Commons : The Hertz Corporation  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ New leader hopes to drive Hertz out of trouble. Hertz, May 19, 2020, accessed June 5, 2020 .
  2. Annual Report 2019. Hertz, February 24, 2020, accessed on June 5, 2020 .
  3. Newspaper article in the Los Angeles Times of February 8, 1985, on the death of Jacobs, accessed February 1, 2018
  4. ^ Penske merger discussed. Reading Eagle , April 8, 1982, accessed April 26, 2015 .
  5. Hertz shows billions taken over and red numbers. Finanznachrichten.de , April 26, 2010, accessed April 26, 2015 .
  6. Hertz bringing Firefly brand to US . In: Travel Weekly . September 3, 2013. Accessed September 3, 2016. English
  7. Stefan Häne: With SUV and helicopter straight to the ski slope. In: bernerzeitung.ch . February 12, 2019, accessed February 13, 2019 .
  8. Car rental company Hertz files for bankruptcy
  9. newsroom.hertz.com (press release from May 22, 2020)