Enemies with Benefits: Daimler and BMW’s Mobility Ecosystem “YOUR NOW”

The case study “Enemies with benefits: Daimler and BMW’s mobility ecosystem” portrays how the German automotive giants Daimler AG and the BMW Group, strong competitors for decades, bundle different ventures and activities in the field of new mobility solutions to create a joint ecosystem called “YOUR NOW”. The ecosystem entails a variety of different business models covering car sharing, ride-hailing, charging, parking, and mobility-as-a-service offerings. These different divisions (that Daimler and BMW often refer to as “verticals”) oftentimes complement each other, but partly also compete with each other. This situation creates a unique potential to combine complementary resources and capabilities, but also causes tensions from competitive behaviors among the single ventures.