Brunel Carriage: A ride-hailing solution for discerning corporates

Managing Director Anthony Edwards introduces the one-stop shop for global ground transportation

Transcript

Ride-hailing apps have been disrupting the personal transportation industry for the last 10 years. But they still struggle to offer the consistent, exceptional service that discerning corporate clients demand. Anthony Edwards is managing director of Brunel Carriage, which combines the latest technology with an old-fashioned commitment to quality and reliability worldwide. He discusses the high level of service the network offers, the importance of sustainability, and the future of the mobility industry.

European CEO: Anthony, let’s start with your network: what do you offer to your corporate clients?

Anthony Edwards: So we offer a local service in London, and then we offer a national service across the whole of the UK, across 8,000 service providers. And then we offer international service, covering and spanning 480 cities and 75 countries.

Working with corporate clients, it’s especially important that we look after them. And we make sure that we’ve got continued reliability. And that follows into our service partners as well. So we will do a continual yearly check on all of our partners, to make sure that they are fully coherent with the standards that we expect – and especially that our clients expect.

So in London for example, we’re setting the example. And we’re looking to find equivalent partners across the UK and internationally that fit with our criteria.

European CEO: And what level of service can I expect?

Anthony Edwards: So, much like an airline, we offer an economy class, business class, and first class operation.

For example if you were using an economy class service, you can expect a hybrid vehicle, much like a premium service for minicab or taxi service.

If you go to a high-end, first class service, you can expect something like a Mercedes S-Class, or a BMW 7-Series; with a fully liveried chauffeur. And you can imagine that chauffeur being your personal concierge service.

European CEO: Why is Brunel so committed to providing this high level, reliable service?

Anthony Edwards: I think you have to look deeply into the history of Brunel to understand. So we are a 30 year old business – my mother and father started the company. We traditionally started in the high-end chauffeur service arena, looking after first class travellers coming into London Heathrow. And from then our business evolved into a global ground transportation one-stop-shop, looking after clients internationally. But also looking more locally, in terms of the London-centric area.

And again, our service is delivered on quality. We’re only as good as our last journey. And from our perspective, the driver is key to providing a quality of service. And that’s something today we are extremely stringent on, especially with new entrants to the marketplace.

European CEO: There is a huge amount of investment going into all kinds of technologies in this industry – where is Brunel focusing?

Anthony Edwards: So Brunel’s core focus right now is investing in hybrid vehicles, and electric vehicles for sustainability in the future. We’re also offering a range of hydrogen-fuel cell vehicles to our clients today.

Sustainability’s important for our client base, to be emissions-compliant for local government, and also for our client base in general.

European CEO: And finally, what do you see as the future of this industry?

Anthony Edwards: I see in five years a movement towards a mobility concept for our corporate clients. So for example, they may be travelling between a ride-hailing service like Brunel, or equally a vehicle-sharing service. And therefore be pushing all equal services into one product – whether it be an application or an online booking service.

And then looking further into the future, we see autonomous cars as definitely on the radar. And how quite we interact with those services in in-car experience will totally change our business.

European CEO: Anthony, thank you very much.

Anthony Edwards: Thank you.