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Go Greyhound:
Flixmobility, already active in the USA, is taking over the US competitor
Photo: Luke MacGregor / REUTERS
The travel platform Flixmobility buys the US long-distance bus company Greyhound Lines, the largest provider of long-distance bus travel in North America.
The Munich-based company, which is best known in Germany for its Flixbus and Flixtrain brands, is taking over 2,400 destinations in the USA for around 172 million US dollars (the equivalent of 148 million euros), as both sides announced on Thursday morning.
"Together, Flixbus and Greyhound will meet the increased demand for environmentally friendly mobility in the USA," said Flixmobility co-founder
André Schwämmlein
(40) on the occasion of the takeover.
For little sponges, however, this is only an intermediate step.
He is pursuing the biggest plans in the long term at home - with the attack on long-distance rail traffic and Deutsche Bahn.
The German company has been operating its Flixbus brand in the USA since 2018.
According to its own information, it currently serves 195 destinations there.
A takeover of Greyhound, which last had sales of 423 million US dollars, was discussed from the start.
Greyhound was previously part of the British transport company Firstgroup.
With the sale, the company strengthens its focus on public transport offers in Great Britain, announced Firstgroup.
How Flixmobility intends to integrate the traditional Greyhound brand in the medium term remained open at first.
At the moment everything stays the same, both companies work separately from each other, it was said.
"With a history going back over 100 years, we know how valuable the Greyhound brand is and we look forward to benefiting from the experience in the future," said Flixmobility.
Above all, it is unclear what will happen to the more than 1000 buses from Geyhound's portfolio.
Flixbus acts as a platform company that in principle neither directly employs drivers nor owns the buses.
Mostly medium-sized partner companies operate the routes offered for Flixbus and usually receive almost 75 percent of sales.
In Germany, Flixmobility has been by far the market leader in the long-distance bus market for years.
After the corona crisis, in which business was largely idle, the Munich-based company now wants to increasingly attack Deutsche Bahn with its own trains.
In economic terms, this is even more important in the long term.
la / phal / dpa