Yellow School Bus
Go-Ahead remains committed to the UK market. However, following a review of potential growth opportunities outside the UK, we decided to enter the North American yellow school bus market.
We believe this an attractive market with significant growth opportunities and fits well with the Group’s strategy of providing high quality, locally focused services. However, we are taking a cautious approach to entry.
In November 2009, we established a small joint venture with Cook Illinois, an established local operator and began running our first contract in August 2010.
The yellow school bus market has many similarities with UK bus but is far larger and more fragmented. The total market is approximately 450,000 buses of which around 150,000 are run by private operators.
The chart below shows approximate market share for the private sector.
The North American yellow school bus market is vast. To illustrate its size, we operate around 3,900 buses in the UK. An equivalent sized operator in the privatised sector of the North American yellow school bus market would have a market share of around 2.5%.