Technology and new entrants push Australian novated leasing beyond its big-business roots

A leasing model long tied to large employers opens up

Novated leasing has historically been dominated by large providers serving big corporations, leaving small-to-medium business owners and their employees without access to the associated tax savings, according to LoanOptions.ai chief executive Julian Fayad in Broker Daily. That dynamic is now being challenged from several directions: the fintech brokerage has launched a division targeting small and medium-sized businesses, a digital platform vendor is pitching end-to-end automation of the leasing journey, and one of Australia's largest EV brands has embedded leasing support directly into its dealer network. ³⁴

The common thread across these moves is distribution rather than product. None of the announcements changes the underlying structure of a novated lease; instead, each aims to widen who can access it and reduce friction at the point an employee considers the benefit. How much practical difference they make to adoption is not yet documented in the available announcements. ¹³

Fintech entrant targets the SME gap

Fintech and asset finance brokerage LoanOptions.ai entered the novated leasing space in June 2026 with a new business division supporting small and medium-sized businesses offering leasing arrangements to staff, as reported by Broker Daily's Julian Barnes. The company appointed Elizabeth Carrasco, who brings more than 16 years' experience across novated leasing, salary packaging and consumer lending, to lead the division. ³

According to Broker Daily, the division will integrate novated leasing into LoanOptions.ai's business-to-business offering, allowing its network of more than 2,000 mortgage brokers, aggregators and corporate partners to refer leasing opportunities, and will use the company's existing lending technology platform to streamline applications and fulfilment. Chief executive Julian Fayad said novated leasing had historically been dominated by large providers serving big corporations, leaving small-to-medium business owners and their employees without access to the tax savings. These are company claims about its own positioning; independent evidence of take-up among SME employees is not yet available. ³

Auto-UX pitches digitisation as the fix for low engagement

Separately, Australian technology company Auto-UX has been promoting digital transformation as the industry's core problem. In a February 2026 article published by HCAMag that the publication disclosed was produced in partnership with Auto-UX, the company launched X-perience Zones, a suite of modules designed to digitise the entire novated leasing journey as the next evolution of its Auto-Pilot platform. Because the article is sponsored content built on Auto-UX's own account, its claims should be read as company assertions rather than independent reporting. ¹

Within that article, Auto-UX chief executive Greg Parkes argued the typical novated lease adoption rate sits around 5 per cent, attributing this to engagement rather than the tax effectiveness of the benefit. He described traditional providers as transaction-focused, leaving employees to manage ongoing leases through call centres and paper-based systems. Auto-UX said it launched Auto-Pilot in April 2024, added an Engage Zone in November 2024 and a Thrive Zone in December 2025, with features for 24/7 quoting and onboarding, employer-side lease management tools, and digital claims processing using document recognition and machine learning. The company's adoption figure and the effectiveness of its platform remain its own assertions, and the article's promotional nature means they have not been independently tested. ¹

BYD and Smart embed leasing at the point of sale

In a more concrete market move, BYD and salary packaging provider Smart announced a strategic partnership on July 26, 2026, in a release distributed via GlobeNewswire, to make electric vehicle ownership more accessible through Smart novated leases at the point of purchase. The partnership covers BYD and its premium brand DENZA, with Smart providing access to more than 2.5 million employees of its client organisations across government, healthcare, education, corporate and not-for-profit sectors. ⁴

The release stated Smart supports more than 580,000 salary packaging customers and manages more than 120,000 novated lease and fleet vehicles. BYD Australia general manager Wing You said the partnership would integrate novated leasing support into the dealership experience, while Smart's Group Executive for Novated Leasing and Electric Vehicle Services, Sid Jha, described it as removing friction at a critical point in the purchase process. Both sets of remarks come from the companies' own announcement. ⁴

The commercial context supplied in the release: official VFACTS data recorded battery electric vehicles at 23 per cent of the Australian new vehicle market in June 2026, and BYD Australia's year-to-date sales reached 52,335 vehicles at the end of June, more than double the same point a year earlier. The release also noted customers can access specific tax savings for EVs through the government's electric car discount under current policy settings. ⁴

The incentive backdrop is changing from 2027

These product moves coincide with a policy shift. In a June 2026 press release issued through Get The Word Out, fleet leasing and management company Streetfleet said the Federal Government will gradually wind back electric vehicle tax incentives under the Electric Car Discount scheme after March 31, 2027. The scheme currently exempts eligible EVs purchased through novated leases from fringe benefits tax. ⁵

According to Streetfleet chief executive James Ehmann, from April 1, 2027, EVs priced above $75,000 will instead attract a discounted FBT rate of 75 per cent of the standard amount, and from 2029 all eligible EVs will move to that discounted arrangement, with luxury EVs priced at roughly $91,000 and some older or used EVs continuing to attract full FBT. Ehmann also claimed the scheme added an estimated 100,000 EVs to Australian roads over the last four years and that around half of all EVs sold nationally are financed through novated leases. These are Streetfleet's figures and its interpretation of the announced changes; existing lease arrangements are grandfathered under the changes it describes. ⁵

What is established and what remains open

The verified events are the three dated announcements themselves: LoanOptions.ai's division launch in June 2026, the Auto-UX product promotion reported in February 2026, and the BYD-Smart partnership in July 2026, alongside the Federal Government's announced post-March 2027 wind-down of EV incentives as described by Streetfleet. The claimed outcomes, including SME take-up, higher adoption through digital platforms and lease volumes generated by the BYD-Smart partnership, are not yet supported by independent evidence. ³⁵⁴¹

Broader parallels exist overseas. In India, Ayvens told ETAuto in September 2026 that corporate car leasing penetration sits at roughly 1 to 1.5 per cent against 20 to 35 per cent in several Southeast Asian markets, and that it plans simplified leasing solutions for small and medium-sized businesses and professionals, showing the extension of leasing beyond large enterprises is a global industry theme rather than an Australian-only one. Whether Australian digital platforms and partnerships translate into materially higher novated leasing participation, particularly once the FBT discount narrows, remains untested. ²