Combining traditional mobility through car sales and future mobility through car-sharing and car-pooling, the Debono Group keeps striving towards an effective future for Malta’s transport network. Its CEO, Geoffrey Debono, spearheads that vision.

Geoffrey has a very clear vision of what mobility should be like: transitioning from driving our own vehicles from point A to point B to being driven around. He also fully realises what that will mean for his company, Malta and even transport internationally.

It may sound challenging but Geoffrey’s own journey within the company was one fraught with initial struggles as he took over the leadership role in 2003 at just 21 when his father, Philip, sadly passed away. He quickly displayed the strong business skills he inherited from both his father and grandfather, and he assumed overall responsibility in 2005, now running the company alongside his brother, Michael, and the executive team.

“Looking back, I was definitely thrown in at the deep end and I had to find a way to survive,” he says. “Although I already had a university education, this new phase was all about learning by doing and, thankfully, I had always been close to the business growing up. It doesn’t hurt that I love cars and the Toyota brand!”

Reflecting on his early goals within the company, Geoffrey says he was focused on positioning Toyota as the number one choice for those buying a car, and wanted to make the brand a household name. “It was fifth or sixth in the market when I took over but we secured the top spot for car sales in a timely manner and have retained it ever since.

“Today, though, my goal is completely different, and it’s all about making the change from selling cars to selling rides. That, in my opinion, is the future of mobility.”

Geoffrey explains that, ultimately, the car is the means for people to get around but, in the future, he believes people will be driven. He does not just talk about it but acts: his company launched a car-pooling solution and the take-up, he reports, was staggering.

He strongly believes that such initiatives, combined with other options such as the company’s GoTo car sharing project or public transport usage, will make for a cohesive strategy for people to move around effectively. He has other ideas in mind, though they will probably have to wait a bit given the prevailing circumstances.

Geoffrey is very much driven by a deep passion for the environment and getting things done. GoTo, for instance, saved 914 tons of CO2 emissions in the year since its launch, while the Cool, the car-pooling solution, was taking an average of 1.25 cars off the road for every trip made by a car in its fleet.

“As a Group we have a dream that, one day, all of the cars on the road will be self-driving, so between 50 and 90 per cent of today’s cars are expected to disappear. This is why we believe, in the future, there will be virtually no traffic, because we are gearing up for a future where people do not have their own cars.”

All of this ties in with Geoffrey’s vision for the creation of a sustainable transport system for the island, based on a transition from private to shared cars.

A shift in mobility thinking continues to be a priority for Geoffrey and his team. There is also the issue of when electric vehicles will become mandatory.

Mobility is not the only issue on Geoffrey’s mind; immovable property is what he has to think about too, specifically the company’s site in Żebbuġ, parts of which is nearly 50 years old. Here too, the idea is to lay stress on a sustainable way of life.

For the Debono Group, and, especially, Geoffrey the main mission remains to effectively providing mobility as a service.

This is a serialisation of the publication Malta CEOs 2020. All interviews took place prior to the COVID-19 outbreak.