Context
Nextlane is a European leader in dealership management and digital retail solutions for car dealers. With more than 700 employees and €100M+ in recurring revenue, the company was formed through the consolidation of over ten software providers across Europe. Each entity brought its own ERP (also called DMS in that vertical) and digital tools as well as its own pricing logic. As Nextlane prepared to launch a unified cloud platform, it needed to harmonize these legacy models into a single, scalable commercial framework.
Challenge
After years of acquisitions, Nextlane operated with a patchwork of commercial models, including perpetual licenses, local subscription models, and disparate pricing metrics by product and market.
The company’s strategic priority was clear: shift to a unified SaaS platform that could simplify customer experience, support cross-product adoption, and sustain profitable growth.
However, this transition carried inherent risks like inconsistent pricing structures, potential revenue leakage during migration, and internal misalignment across product, finance, and sales teams.
Solution
Northlane partnered with Nextlane as lead pricing advisor to design a unified commercial model and a pragmatic migration roadmap.
The engagement focused on balancing revenue protection, customer adoption, and operational simplicity.
Key deliverables included:
- Unified pricing and packaging framework to consolidate legacy models and articulate clear platform value
- New platform bundles that offered incremental functionality, creating a clear upgrade path and perceived customer benefit
- Bottom-up migration strategy defining which customer cohorts to migrate first, sequencing for revenue stability and adoption speed
- Cross-functional alignment across Product, Finance, Sales, and Executive teams to ensure operational readiness and governance
Results
- Established a cohesive commercial foundation to support the transition from legacy software to a unified SaaS platform
- Created a clear and defensible value narrative aligned to customer outcomes, reducing sales friction
- Delivered a migration roadmap that balanced ambition and risk, protecting recurring revenue while enabling platform growth
- Built strong internal alignment across leadership teams, paving the way for execution at scale
