I agree that this dog will be on the mend soon. One must appreciate how incredibly poorly run Budget Rent-a-Car was when Ford owned it to realize that the turnaround process would take several years. Ryder, if it is possible, was even worse, yet was a very cagey acquisition, as was Premier and CruiseAmerica.
The management team is entirely new, and in my experience are some of the best. They are building for the long term. Not just the Team Rental group, but the next 2-3 layers of executives, most of which have now been replaced. They still have a lot of work to do to turn each of the business units around, to make them mesh together, and to deliver on the long-term strategy, but they are absolutely driven to succeed. Within 3-6 months the results will start to show.
I have worked with top management at most of the big companies in this industry, and while the old Budget team (under Ford) was one of the worst, the new one is unquestionably the best. This dog was dead and buried two years ago, and they dug it out, brought it back to life, and put it in intensive care. The dog is now on the mend and I predict a full recovery; it will even regain its youthful bounce.
I am already thinking past that stage. The management team is capable of doing much more than even the acquisitions to date would suggest, and once the BD business is humming smoothly, I'm sure they'll be looking for more growth opportunities. Within the next 6-12 months I'm going to start focusing on undervalued, poorly run companies they might want to acquire and fix. If they can fix the old BRAC business, they can fix almost anything.
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