Transformation Group
The Transformation Working Group brings together rental professionals from across Europe to support and guide the evolution of the European rental industry, exploring what is changing, anticipating what is coming, and accelerating the industry’s transformation through practical recommendations and initiatives. It focuses on new technologies and business models, shifting customer and workforce expectations, market unification across Europe, and the demands of a more resilient and sustainable industry.
Prepare for the future
Identify, analyse the major trends reshaping rental companies and their operating environments, from technological development and evolving business models to changing customer expectations and demographic shifts – and translate these insights into practical guidance for members.
Build one market
Promote best practices and practical strategies that help rental businesses of all sizes operate across borders, serve customers better, and access new commercial models, supporting a truly unified European rental market.
Transform together
Support operational, organisational and commercial innovation across the sector, fostering adaptability, building long-term resilience, and ensuring that no rental company transforms alone.
FAQ
Projects related to People
Attracting and retaining talent is a critical part of the future competitiveness of the rental industry, and the ERA Future Group has delivered a number of projects on the theme of human resources:
- The How to compete with other industries in securing talent for the Future report provides a European-wide study including major trends and issues that are a cause of concern to rental industry representatives throughout Europe.
- The Job Positions in the equipment rental industry chart offers an overview of the job descriptions that are available in the rental industry so that people with skills can find matches with the needs of a rental company. It also allows the identification of the job positions that are common to most ERA members.
- The Job Positions Profiling: Branch Manager report pinpoints the key features of the role and the attributes that make a successful manager. It includes topics such as daily tasks, responsibilities, collaboration and leadership, career background and values and personality.
- The Use of HR KPIs in rental companies report focuses mainly on the key performance indicators used to evaluate the success of the human resources departments of ERA members. It looks at the different KPIs used during each phase of the employee life cycle, such as recruitment, onboarding and regular employment, and examine further those which are used predominantly by HR managers in the rental industry.
- The Impact of Social Media on Recruitment and HR report looks at the online presence of the rental industry and its use of social media for recruitment, and gives companies ideas to consider when advertising vacancies and tips on how to drive user engagement to attract talent.
- The Exit Interviews report gives rental companies guidelines on interviewing departing employees and provides deeper insight into how to improve HR strategies to retain employees.
See our Working in rental page for more information.
Projects related to Customers
The CRM Guide for Choosing and Implementing a CRM System describes the importance of CRM systems, sets out criteria for success and offers a number case studies and best practices from leading European rental companies.
Projects related to Technology
The Rental Branch of the Future project looked at the main trends that will influence the equipment rental industry in the next 10 years, from social, environmental and strategic phenomena to technology, talent and the workforce, and evaluated how disruptive and soon the impact might be.
A shortlist of 50 phenomena was initially identified, which was narrowed down to 36. Out of these, technological changes were considered to be the most disruptive and likely to have the most immediate impact, with five out of the ten most disruptive phenomena identified relating to technology and four out of those five expected to impact the industry in the next five years.
ERA x KPMG_From Digitalization to AI_Final report_14.11.2025
Transformation Group members
Fréderic Kerkhofs (Atlas Copco), Roland Meurs (Boels), Michel Boels (Boels), Marco Moncada (CGT Edilizia), Vincent Ranaivoson (Kiloutou), Daniela Niederstaetter (Niederstaetter), Nicanor Pinole (Gomez Oviedo), Kari-Tapio Saarela (Renta Group), Kees Van Benschop (Riwal), Stefan Ponea (Access Master), Cornelia Kuratli (Avesco), David Rudnianski(Loxam), Fannar Páll Vilhjálmsson(Byko), Joao Lourenco(Transgrua), Claire Poinsignon(Kiloutou), Lewis Weal(Sunbelt Rentals), Adriano Destro (D’AVINO).