Lankan-built software is transforming the vehicle rental industry

Thursday, 18 February 2021 00:43 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Navotar team

The car rental sector has undergone a phenomenal transformation in the last decade with shifts in consumer behaviour and use of technologies; this has given rise to new subsets in the ground transportation sector forcing existing players to innovate. Companies like Navotar were among the first to use technology to drive change in the car rental industry.

“Today’s consumers want fast and frictionless solutions to satisfy their travel needs. As the new entrants in ground transportation are innovating intensely to capture a bigger share of this market, failure to adapt by the SME car rental sector means that they could lose a large share of the market,” Navotar CEO Sanker Shivanathan stated.

“This is where Navotar stepped in embracing technological advances to help small and medium car rental companies to stay relevant and benefit from technology in both operational and consumer experience,” he added.

Navotar’s cloud-based car rental software, which is known for being economical and easy to use is trusted by 1000+ rental businesses in 70+ countries. With its parent company in Canada, Navotar also operates a development and marketing hub in Sri Lanka, which has been a crucial component of its operations and global journey of growth. Following Navotar’s acquisition by Valsoft, the company is now poised for even greater growth.

Shivanathan credits much of this success to Navotar having a strong customer-centric focus. While deeply ingrained into the company’s DNA today, it didn’t happen overnight without a struggle. Much of Navotar’s support team is based in Sri Lanka, which works 24/7.

“Back when we first started, there was only a handful of us. We’d set alarms for meetings at 2 AM and demonstrations at 4 AM. It was a constant struggle. Having overcome those hardships and scaling our operations, we were able to build a larger team to better serve our customers,” says ‎Navotar Director of Business Development Visharathan Kugamoorthy.

Beyond fleet management, the company supports its clients with a range of services. From website development to digital marketing, Navotar’s Sri Lankan team helps its clients with everything they need for growth.

“By offering these services Navotar is a one-stop solution to start the car rental business,” Visharathan noted. These efforts have greatly paid off with Navotar receiving the award for Best Support by Software Suggest in 2019, which is one of many accolades the company has received.

Having overcome challenges to build a global presence, both Sanker and Visharathan stated that their mission is to make it easier for anyone to enter the rental industry. Towards this goal, the company has now embarked on the next step on this journey. Valsoft Corporation, a Candian-based company specialising in building vertical market software companies, announced its acquisition of Navotar. Commenting on the acquisition, Aspire Software CEO Michael Assi said, “We are thrilled to welcome the Navotar team, clients and partners to the Aspire Software family. The team and culture are well aligned with our values, which has also made this transaction seamless. We could not be prouder to have Navotar join our car rental portfolio.”