Hyperdrive
Car-Sharing Boom Gets An Unlikely New Entrant
- Spanish crude producer sets up venture with Kia in Madrid
- Wible uses gasoline stations for parking and charging cars
Traffic on Cibeles Square in Madrid.
Photographer: Angel Navarrete/Bloomberg
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The car sharing boom that has engulfed major cities from New York to Tokyo has gained an unlikely new investor: Spain’s largest oil producer, Repsol SA.
The Madrid-based company has set up a joint venture with South Korea’s Kia Motors Corp. in the Spanish capital with a fleet of 500 hybrid vehicles. The firm, called Wible, is the fourth in the city to offer clients the possibility of picking up cars and leaving them in a different place, taking advantage of rules that exempt electric vehicles from driving bans in certain areas and paying for public parking.