Fleet Advantage partners with Cox

Specialty finance and fleet management firm Fleet Advantage is partnering with automotive services provider Cox Automotive for nationwide fleet maintenance and repair services. 

Through the partnership with Cox Automotive and its subsidiary FleetNet America, Fleet Advantage customers benefit from Cox Automotive’s more than 65,000 maintenance and repair vendors, Brian Antonellis, vice president of fleet operations at Fleet Advantage, told Equipment Finance News. The collaboration was first announced at the annual American Trucking Association’s (ATA) Technology & Maintenance Council (TMC) Annual Meeting & Transportation Technology Exhibition in New Orleans on March 4. 

The rising cost of truck operations makes the need for data and understanding of economics critical for fleet operators, he said 

“If you think about how much it costs to run a Class A tractor, the most impactful way that you can save money is to correctly manage the lifecycle,” he said. “You have to buy a truck correctly, spec it for the right work it’s going to do. You have to manage the data, understand the fuel economy and the maintenance and repair data.” 

Reducing maintenance costs 

The cost of operating a truck surpassed $2 per mile for the first time in 2022, landing at $2.25 per mile, according to the American Transportation Research Institute’s Operational Costs of Trucking Report 2023 Update. By unbundling the fleet and maintenance costs that typically come with full-service style leases, Fleet Advantage achieves customer savings, Antonellis said. “When you take those two components, and you separate them, we’re seeing savings somewhere in that $500 to $700 per month per truck, and that can drive a lot of savings toward a fleet when you start thinking about, hundreds, if not thousands of trucks,” he said.

The full-service lease “payment will typically be the [full] price of the truck plus a margin, and the [price of] maintenance plus a margin gives customers their own [cost] number,” Antonellis said. “What we are advocates for, what we’ve worked with dozens of our customers to do, is we say you get a lot of value from separating those costs and understanding them individually.” 

Unbundling offers Fleet Advantage customers increased financial flexibility and cost savings, Antonellis said. Fleet Advantage has unbundled, or separated finance and maintenance costs, more than 3,000 trucks over the past few years, he said. It unbundled 700 trucks in 2023, according to a March 4 Fleet Advantage release. 

Fleet Advantage has over $3 billion in assets under management, with most of the assets in the Class 8 truck space, Antonellis said. Fleet Advantage surpassed $1 billion in last-12-month lease volume on Feb. 6, according to previous EFN reports. 

Registration is now open for Equipment Finance Connect, the nation’s only dealer-centric equipment lending and leasing event, which will take place May 5-7 in Nashville, Tenn. Learn about the event and free dealer registration at EquipmentFinanceConnect.com.