Avis 2014 Annual Report Download - page 22

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15
OUR TECHNOLOGIES
Car Rental
We use a broad range of technologies in our car rental operations, substantially all of which are linked to what we
call Wizard, our worldwide reservation, rental, data processing and information management system. The Wizard
system enables us to process millions of incoming customer inquiries each day, providing our customers with
accurate and timely information about our locations, rental rates and vehicle availability, as well as the ability to
place or modify reservations. Additionally, the Wizard system is linked to all major travel distribution networks
worldwide and provides real-time processing for travel agents, travel industry partners (such as airlines and online
travel sites), corporate travel departments and individual consumers through our websites or contact centers. The
Wizard system also provides personal profile information to our reservation and rental agents to help us better
serve our customers.
We also use data supplied from the Wizard system and airline (or ”third-party”) reservation systems in certain
proprietary information management systems to maintain centralized control of major business processes such
as fleet acquisition and logistics, sales to corporate accounts and determination of rental rates. The principal
components of the systems we employ include:
•Fleet planning model. We have a comprehensive decision tool to develop fleet plans and schedules for
the acquisition and disposition of our fleet, along with fleet age, mix, mileage and cost reports based upon
these plans and schedules. This tool allows management to monitor and change fleet volume and
composition on a daily basis and to optimize our fleet plan based on estimated business levels and
available repurchase and guaranteed depreciation programs. We also use third-party software to further
optimize our fleet acquisition, rotation and disposition activities.
•Yield management. We have a yield management system which is designed to enhance profits by
providing greater control of vehicle availability and rate availability changes at our rental locations. Our
system monitors and forecasts supply and demand to support our efforts to optimize volume and rate at
each location. Integrated into this yield management system is a fleet distribution module that takes into
consideration the costs as well as the potential benefits associated with distributing vehicles to various
rental locations within a geographic area to accommodate rental demand at these locations. The fleet
distribution module makes specific recommendations for movement of vehicles between locations.
•Pricing decision support systems. Pricing in the vehicle rental industry is highly competitive and complex.
To improve our ability to respond to rental rate changes in the marketplace, we have utilized sophisticated
systems to gather and report competitive industry rental rate changes every day. Our systems, using data
from third-party reservation systems as its source of information, automatically scan rate movements and
report significant changes to our staff of pricing analysts for evaluation. These systems greatly enhance
our ability to gather and respond to rate changes in the marketplace. In 2014, we began to implement an
integrated pricing and fleet optimization tool that has allowed us to test and implement improved pricing
strategies and optimization algorithms, as well as automate the implementation of certain price changes.
•Business mix model. We have developed a strategic planning model to evaluate discrete components of
our business relative to each other. The model considers revenue and costs to determine the potential
margin contribution of each discrete segment. The model develops business mix and fleet optimization
recommendations by using data from our financial systems, the Wizard system and the fleet and revenue
management systems along with management’s objectives and targets.
•Enterprise data warehouse. We have developed a sophisticated and comprehensive electronic data
storage and retrieval system which retains information related to various aspects of our business. This
data warehouse allows us to take advantage of comprehensive management reports and provides easy
access to data for strategic decision making for our brands.
•Sales and marketing systems. We have developed a sophisticated system of online data tracking which
enables our sales force to analyze key account information of our corporate customers including historical
and current rental activity, revenue and booking sources, top renting locations, rate usage categories and
customer satisfaction data. We use this information, which is updated weekly and captured on a country-