Talks On Mobility

In this episode of Talks on Mobility, Tal Ginat, Chief Business Officer at Reins, talks orchestration, the shift to open-loop payments, and how forecourt retailers can grow their fleet business without tearing out everything that came before.

Ginat explains why the company many will remember as Picafuel rebranded as Reins: to shift its focus from managing card issuers’ programs to actively growing them. He describes the problems he hears from retailers and issuers across Europe, Latin America and APAC alike: IT stacks that have swelled over two decades, with four or five systems trying to manage a single customer. At the same time, fleets themselves are getting harder to serve, mixing diesel trucks crossing borders with hybrid and electric company cars, and drivers who now expect to pay for tolls, parking and hotels on the same account. With corporate fleets accounting for roughly 60% of new car registrations in Europe, he argues the complexity is growing even faster than the number of vehicles.

His answer is what Reins calls an orchestration layer: one place, one policy and one account from which a retailer can offer fuel, EV charging, car wash, lubricants, loyalty and open-loop cards, making each new service a business decision rather than another integration project. Ginat stresses that a smooth customer journey goes far beyond a seamless checkout, running from onboarding and authorization through to invoicing and after-sales contact, and that professional drivers, for whom time is money, will switch to whoever makes their lives easier. On legacy systems, he advises against a rip-and-replace mindset, recommending small wins such as getting cards into Apple Pay and Google Pay wallets first to build confidence and secure senior buy-in.

Ginat also offers a practical take on AI, which he sees less as a chatbot on top of a loyalty app and more as a decision-making tool for tailoring offers, understanding share of wallet and comparing station performance, with Reins currently piloting an AI assistant that lets fleet managers create cards or pull transaction reports simply by asking. Looking ahead, he believes open-loop and scheme-based cards will let fuel retailers move into corporate, expense management and T&E cards, sizing the opportunity by a company’s headcount rather than its vehicle count, pointing to North America, where some players already report non-fuel volume matching their fuel volume.

Fuel retailers have never had so much data, yet running the business keeps getting harder. At the NACS Show 2026 in Las Vegas, Titan Cloud CEO Bret Garrett and Adi Raz, VP of Product & Data Science, discussed how the company, which has more than 100,000 fueling sites under management, helps operators turn that data into action.

For Garrett, the problem is not a lack of information. “Our businesses that we’re working with actually have a lot of data, but they are short on people, they’re short on systems, they’re short on an ability to process that data,” he said. Leaner teams are overwhelmed, and Titan Cloud’s role is to clean up the data and surface insights operators can act on.

That makes AI a means, not an end. “Most of our customers don’t really care how they get the insights,” Garrett said. “They want the answer.” Raz agreed: “It’s not AI for AI’s sake.” She stressed that people remain central. “The human is always going to be there,” she added. “It’s empowering the person to do what they’re best at, which is not manual, repetitive work that AI can do for them.”

One example is a new invoicing platform that lets operators photograph a bill of lading and a delivery ticket, match them instantly and generate an invoice, easing cash flow. Garrett sees this kind of precision becoming essential as fuel volumes decline in some markets. “How are they going to squeeze out the same profit with 1% less fuel next year? That’s where Titan comes in,” he said.

The same approach applies to EV charging, where Titan Cloud wants to support customers. Chargers generate vast amounts of data, and Raz noted that “almost everything in an EV charger can be fixed remotely,” provided the right signals are identified.

Looking ahead, Garrett wants to connect compliance, maintenance, analytics, supply and logistics in a single platform. That way, for example, a truck is not dispatched to a site where maintenance is under way. For Raz, the competition will shift: “It’s not going to be about solving the problem. It’s going to be who can solve it the quickest, the best, the most accurate, the most consistent way.”

Grabado como una mesa redonda durante UNITI expo 2026 en Stuttgart y moderado por Gonzalo Solanot, Editor & Communications Lead de MobilityPlaza, este episodio de Talks on Mobility reúne a tres proveedores que operan en toda América Latina: Juan Carlos Toledo, de Equipetrol, Luigi Sisto, de Tecsofuel, y Katharina Krawinkel, de PWM, para debatir cómo el mercado minorista de combustibles de la región está pasando de centrarse en el combustible a centrarse en los servicios complementarios, y qué obstáculos se interponen en este camino.

Angola’s national oil and fuel retail company Sonangol finds is immerser in a process of extreme modernization. The man behind that vision is Mauro Graça, CEO of Sonangol Distribuição e Comercialização. In this episode, he discusses the scale of the transformation underway at Sonangol's downstream unit, which manages storage, distribution, bunkering, aviation fuel, and a retail network holding roughly two-thirds of Angola's fuel market. The company is renewing its stations and back-office systems alike, pushing for more inventory visibility, tighter operational control, and greater automation so that management can track any station's stock in real time. The end goal, Graça said, is a network that is safer, more efficient, and more reliable, built around a stronger customer experience rather than fuel sales alone.

That shift is reshaping what a Sonangol station looks like. Graça described stations evolving into multi-service hubs where a driver can refuel, grab a coffee at the convenience store, stop at a pharmacy, or wash the car. All in one digitalized, connected location. He linked that strategy directly to Angola's young, digitally connected population, which he sees as the company's biggest opportunity to build loyalty around the Sonangol brand rather than around fuel price alone. Food and beverage plays into that too, though Graça noted demand varies sharply by region, from stations where customers linger and socialize to ones built around quick breakfast and commuter stops.

Conversamos con Fitzgerald Cantero, Director de Estudios, Proyectos e Información de la Organización Latinoamericana y Caribeña de Energía (OLACDE), sobre la acelerada transición energética que está transformando la región. A partir del más reciente informe sobre el Panorama Energético de América Latina y el Caribe, Cantero ofrece una visión panorámica de un continente que atraviesa múltiples cambios simultáneos: desde los combustibles fósiles hacia las energías renovables, desde el transporte tradicional hacia la electromovilidad, y desde el modelo exportador de materias primas hacia un potencial polo industrial dentro de la transición energética global.

Exploramos qué factores posicionan a América Latina de manera única en un contexto de crecientes tensiones energéticas globales, desde su riqueza mineral hasta su avance hacia una matriz eléctrica más limpia, así como los desafíos pendientes para convertir ese potencial en desarrollo sostenible. También abordamos el crecimiento del 851% del parque de vehículos eléctricos en la región entre 2022 y 2025, el papel estratégico que continúa teniendo el gas natural, el potencial de los biocombustibles y las lecciones que América Latina puede tomar de las experiencias de Europa, Norteamérica y Asia.

Fitzgerald Cantero

Cantero es Director de Estudios, Proyectos e Información en OLACDE, la organización intergubernamental de energía integrada por 27 países miembros de América Latina y el Caribe. En este cargo, supervisa la elaboración de informes técnicos, perspectivas energéticas y herramientas de apoyo a la toma de decisiones que ayudan a los gobiernos a planificar e implementar sus políticas energéticas. Cuenta con una trayectoria de 20 años en el sector público de Uruguay, donde lideró la Dirección Nacional de Energía y Presidió la Administración del Mercado Eléctrico.

“América Latina tiene una gran oportunidad en un mundo cada vez más tenso e incierto. Tenemos recursos naturales, potencial energético, capacidad productiva y personas.”

“Históricamente, hemos sido exportadores de materias primas e importadores de bienes manufacturados. Hoy tenemos la oportunidad de pensar de manera diferente y planificar a 20, 30 o 40 años.”

MobilityPlaza sat down with Tom Hurst, UK Country Director at Fastned, to talk grid constraints, the CPO versus energy major debate, payment trends, and the projects shaping the future of fast charging in Britain.

In this episode of Talks on Mobility, we gather three industry insiders for a preview of UNITI expo 2026, the leading service station and car wash trade fair in Europe, taking place May 19–21 in Stuttgart. Peter Hack (Hack AG), Juan Carlos Quintero (PWM), and Ben Boroewitsch (com-a-tec & UNITI expo), share their perspectives on what to expect from the biggest edition yet, and what it says about an industry in transformation.

The episode paints a clear picture of a sector in structural transition. Convenience retail has overtaken car wash as the fastest-growing segment since 2022, with operators increasingly seeking integrated technology solutions rather than standalone products. Peter Hack highlighted how customers a looking for premium food services with technology and private label having a big impact.

UNITI expo has been on a journey from a regional petroleum retail trade fair in 2014 to what he now describes as an event for the full mobility ecosystem, reflecting how dramatically the industry itself has changed. Ben expressed particular excitement about the expanded Future Mobility Lounge, which he sees as a sign of the growing appetite for alternative fuels and next-generation mobility solutions.

The international dimension of UNITI expo has also become one of its defining features, with technology attracting operators from all over the world. The speakers converged on the same insight: that in a B2B world built on trust, nothing replaces meeting face to face.

Peter Hack

Hack is CEO of Hack AG, one of Germany's leading manufacturers of bakery and pastry products for the mobility and convenience sector. Under his leadership, Hack AG has become a trusted partner to major international forecourt and convenience retail networks. Hack AG is also the company behind the genussGARTEN, the iconic food court experience that has become one of the most celebrated features of UNITI expo, bringing high-end convenience food concepts to the heart of the trade show floor.

"The combination of knowledge transfer, networking, culinary delights — and for me the great after-show parties — makes for a very, very interesting mix in this short time."

"The market on the petrol station and the food service side is looking more and more to high-end convenience products. The same quality you'd expect anywhere else, now in a ready meal."

Juan Carlos Quintero

Quintero is Sales Director at PWM, a global supplier of electronic price displays and customer journey solutions for the service station industry. A seasoned industry traveller with deep knowledge of forecourt markets across multiple continents, Quintero drives the international business of PWM. From Alaska to Australia, PWM's electronic price signs can be found in over 120 countries worldwide. 

"UNITI expo is big enough to have a lot of impressions of technology and new ideas, but also small enough to do good quality networking. It's the perfect size."

"If you are a gas station, you cannot be quiet. The future is uncertain. They have to change, they have to move, they have to look for cooperation — not only a product, but a full-service solution."

Ben Boroewitsch

Boroewitsch is CEO of com-a-tec, a full-service communications agency based in southwest Germany with three decades of experience in brand strategy, media production, and B2B marketing across technical and industrial sectors. As co-organizer of UNITI expo, he has played a central role in building the event into Europe's leading trade fair for the service station and car wash industries. A driving force behind its international expansion strategy, Boroewitsch has helped transform UNITI expo from a regional petroleum retail show into a global mobility ecosystem platform

"It's the biggest UNITI expo in history.