Cox Enterprises is creating a new division, Cox Automotive, aimed at melding together 20 auto-related businesses ranging from auto auctions to online auto listings.
In the past five years, Atlanta-based Cox Enterprises has invested more than $3 billion in acquisitions and start-ups of auto-related businesses, such as Kelley Blue Book, an auto valuation publisher that was acquired in 2010.
“It is an area ripe for additional growth for us,” said John Dyer, president and chief executive of Cox Enterprises.
The privately held media and communications company’s other major subsidiaries are Cox Communications, one of the nation’s largest cable television operators; and Cox Media Group, which operates TV and radio stations, and newspapers, including The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Cox Enterprises long ago began branching out into auto service firms, acquiring the auto auction firm Manheim in the late 1960s and launching the AutoTrader auto listings business in the late 1990s.
After buying or launching about a dozen businesses, Cox’s auto marketing and related services now account for almost half of Cox Enterprises’ 50,000 employees and $4.5 billion of its total revenue of $16 billion.
The businesses were previously divided between Manheim and AutoTrader Group. Sandy Schwartz, who was president over both groups, will now head Cox Automotive.
Dyer said the individual businesses will keep their brands, but grouping them together under one organization will allow the various units’ sales staff, managers and others to work together and integrate data from a broad range of customers to offer better products and services.
“This gives us an opportunity to speak to how important we are in the automotive space,” said Dyer. “This is about better serving our customers.”
Besides Manheim, AutoTrader and Kelley Blue Book, Cox Automotive’s 20 businesses include software firms such as vAuto, vinSolutions and Haystak Digital Marketing; financial services such as NextGear Capital and Go Financial; and several domestic and international auto wholesale and support businesses.
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