M is building on the back of Volvo's Swedish car sharing service, Sunfleet. Volvo expects to fold Sunfleet into M in 2019. You won't have to wait that long to see what M is doing, thankfully. It's revealing more details later in the year, and expects a wider beta test of its offering in the fall.

This isn't an unusual development when VW and other brands have been setting up their own mobility-focused companies. And the goal is similar: Volvo knows it may lose buyers as app-based services and self-driving cars take hold, and M could give it a similar stream of cash even if its traditional car business suffers.