|
United Rentals, Inc. - Equipment Rental -
Category Directory
Five
Greenwich Office Park,
Greenwich, Connecticut 06830
(203)
622-3131
www.unitedrentals.com
Sales
$2.9
billion
Business Description
United Rentals is the largest equipment rental company in North America. We
offer for rent over 600 types of equipment—everything from heavy machines to
hand tools—through our network of more than 730 rental locations in the
United States, Canada and Mexico. Our customers include construction and
industrial companies, manufacturers, utilities, municipalities, homeowners
and others. In 2003, we added 200,000 new customers, increasing our total
customer base to 1.9 million, and generated revenues of approximately $2.9
billion.
Our fleet of rental equipment, the largest in the world, includes over
500,000 units having an original purchase price of approximately $3.5
billion. The fleet includes:
• General construction and industrial equipment, such as backhoes,
skid-steer loaders, forklifts, earth moving equipment, material handling
equipment, compressors, pumps and generators;
• Aerial work platforms, such as scissor lifts and boom lifts;
• General tools and light equipment, such as power washers, water pumps,
heaters and hand tools;
• Traffic control equipment, such as barricades, cones, warning lights,
message boards and pavement marking systems; and
• Trench safety equipment for below ground work, such as trench shields,
aluminum hydraulic shoring systems, slide rails, crossing plates,
construction lasers and line testing equipment.
In addition to renting equipment, we sell used rental equipment, act as a
dealer for new equipment and sell related merchandise and contractor
supplies, parts and service.
Products and Services
Our principal products and services are described below. For financial
information concerning our foreign and domestic operations, see note 17 of
our notes to consolidated financial statements included elsewhere in this
Report.
Equipment Rental. We offer for rent over 600 different types of equipment on
a daily, weekly or monthly basis. The types of equipment that we offer
include general construction and industrial equipment; aerial work
platforms; traffic control equipment; trench safety equipment; and general
tools and light equipment.
Our fleet of rental equipment is the largest in the world and includes over
500,000 units having an original purchase price of approximately $3.5
billion. We estimate that each of the following categories accounted for 10%
or more of our equipment rental revenues in 2003: (i) aerial lift equipment
(approximately 27%), (ii) earth moving equipment (approximately 12%) and
(iii) forklifts (approximately 10%). We believe that our fleet is one of the
newest and best maintained in the industry. The weighted average age of our
fleet is approximately 40 months.
Used Equipment Sales. We routinely sell used rental equipment and invest in
new equipment in order to manage the age, composition and size of our fleet.
We also sell used equipment in response to customer demand for this
equipment. The rate at which we replace used equipment with new equipment
depends on a number of factors, including changing general economic
conditions, growth opportunities, the need to adjust fleet composition to
meet customer requirements and local demand, and the age of the fleet.
We principally sell used equipment through our national sales force, which
can access many resale markets across North America. We also sell used
equipment through our website (www.unitedrentals.com), which includes an
online database of used equipment available for sale.
New Equipment Sales. We sell equipment for many leading equipment
manufacturers. The manufacturers that we represent and the brands that we
carry include: Genie and JLG (aerial lifts); Multiquip, Wacker, Bomag, and
Honda USA (compaction equipment, generators, and pumps); Sullair
(compressors); Skytrak and Lull (rough terrain reach forklifts); Thomas and
Takeuchi (skid-steer loaders and mini-excavators); and Terex (off-road dump
trucks and telehandlers). The type of new equipment that we sell varies by
location.
Related Merchandise and Contractor Supplies, Parts and Other Services. At
most of our branches, we sell a variety of supplies and merchandise such as
saw blades, fasteners, drill bits, hard hats, gloves and other safety
equipment. We also offer repair and maintenance services and sell parts for
equipment that is owned by our customers.
In 2002, we launched an initiative to increase merchandise and contractor
supplies sales across our network by building on the best practices of our
strongest retail locations. As part of this continuing initiative, we are
(1) upgrading merchandise displays, (2) adding merchandise sales
representatives, and (3) offering the merchandise to our customers through
our sales force and catalogues. In 2003, we experienced growth in
merchandise sales of approximately 15%. Our goal is to grow our merchandise
sales by 20% to 30% per year over the next five years.
Our Rentalman™ Software. We have a subsidiary that develops and markets
software for use by equipment rental companies in managing and operating
multiple branch locations. The RentalmanTM software package developed by
this subsidiary is used by many of the largest equipment rental companies.
Customers
Our customer base is highly diversified and ranges from Fortune 500
companies to small businesses and homeowners. Our largest customer accounted
for less than 1% of our revenues in 2003 and our top 10 customers accounted
for less than 3% of our revenues in 2003.
Our customer base varies by branch and is determined by several factors,
including the equipment mix and marketing focus of the particular branch and
the business composition of the local economy. Our customers include:
• construction companies that use equipment for building and renovating
commercial buildings, warehouses, industrial and manufacturing plants,
office parks, airports, residential developments and other facilities;
• industrial companies—such as manufacturers, chemical companies, paper
mills, railroads, ship builders and utilities—that use equipment for plant
maintenance, upgrades, expansion and construction;
• municipalities that require equipment for a variety of purposes, such as
traffic control and highway construction and maintenance; and
• homeowners and other individuals that use equipment for projects that
range from simple repairs to major renovations.
Equipment Rental Industry Overview
Based on industry sources, we estimate that the U.S. equipment rental
industry has grown from approximately $6.6 billion in annual rental revenues
in 1990 to about $23.5 billion in 2003. This represents a compound annual
growth rate of approximately 10.3%, although in the past two years industry
rental revenues decreased by about $1.3 billion. The recent downturn in
industry revenues is a reflection of the significant slowdown in private
non-residential construction activity. This activity declined 5.2% in 2003
and 13.2% in 2002 according to Department of Commerce data. Our industry is
particularly sensitive to changes in non-residential construction activity
because to date the principal end market for rental equipment has been
non-residential construction. When non-residential construction activity
eventually rebounds, we would expect to see our industry resume its
long-term growth trend.
We believe that long-term industry growth, in addition to reflecting general
economic expansion, is driven by an end-user market that increasingly
recognizes the many advantages of renting equipment rather than owning.
Customers recognize that by renting they can:
• avoid the large capital investment required for many equipment purchases;
• access a broad selection of equipment and select the equipment best suited
for each particular job;
• reduce storage and maintenance costs; and
• access the latest technology without investing in new equipment.
While the construction industry has to date been the principal user of
rental equipment, industrial companies, utilities and others are
increasingly using rental equipment for plant maintenance, plant turnarounds
and other operations requiring the periodic use of equipment. We believe
that over the long term, increasing rentals by the industrial sector could
become a more significant factor in driving our industry’s growth.
Equipment Rental
Companies in the Directory
United Rentals
|
|
