Industry veteran and Kredo Mobility founder and CEO Kriben Reddy has launched a new digital solutions service aimed at tackling some of the challenges the automotive sector has battled for many years, including fraud, high costs and deteriorating consumer creditworthiness.

Kredo Mobility is a homegrown digital solution developed to streamline processes, identify the right customers quickly, reduce fraud, offer a unified single view of customers and vehicles and provide real-time pricing information for vehicles.

South Africa’s automotive industry is under immense pressure, as declining sales and high fixed costs take their toll on consumers, dealers, original-equipment manufacturers, banks and insurers alike, and while the industry has evolved and developed significantly over the past two decades, many gaps in the market remain, he said.

Kredo Mobility aims to “reshape” the local automotive sector by making mobility more accessible and affordable for consumers, and more efficient and effective for dealers and the broader ecosystem, through a unified data view that could improve dealer decision-making power tenfold and enhance competitiveness in a fast-evolving market.

“What we need is a more competitive, transparent and consumer-friendly automotive market, that makes the entire ecosystem from dealer to consumer stronger, more efficient and more sustainable. We want to help dealers grow and reduce costs, and see consumers benefit from a fairer and more competitive environment.”

He explained that, as dealers struggle to access comprehensive, consolidated insights that combine vehicle and customer information, a more competitive and cohesive data landscape in the industry will reduce verification costs, foster innovation and improve operational efficiency.

“One of the capabilities we offer is early identification, qualification and verification of the customer at point of need. This enables a dealer to understand everything that he needs to know at that point in time about that individual’s potential risk or fraud.”

This extends to whether a customer can qualify for finance or potentially be considered for an alternative product, as deteriorating consumer creditworthiness limits affordability and reduces success rates in vehicle financing.

Data shows that only around 15% of finance applications convert into actual deals, placing pressure on dealers to identify high-quality prospects from the outset.

However, while a customer may not qualify for vehicle finance, they can potentially be considered for an alternative product, such as a long-term rental, a subscription-based type of product or a lease type of an agreement.

“By consolidating vehicle and customer data into a single, comprehensive view, we give dealers a powerful tool to streamline operations and make more confident decisions. At the same time, as verification costs rise, many dealers have been forced to reduce the number of checks they perform, leaving them vulnerable to fraud. Our robust fraud prevention tools address this issue by identifying and eliminating risks early in the process,” said Reddy.

“The fact is that technology is changing the industry forever. Our AI-powered insights level the playing field for smaller dealers, giving them the same competitive edge as larger players. This allows all dealers to compete on an equal footing, regardless of size or resources, and gives consumers access to the mobility they so desperately need.”