File:OpenMove.docx

Title

OpenMove - open platform for mobile ticketing

Short Description

OpenMove is an open platform for mobile ticketing: free and available for bus, train, subway and parking, it features app for users, backoffice and APIs for Public Administration and tools for ticket inspection.

Why?

Mobile ticketing is troublesome: market solutions for Public Administrations are expensive, focus only on specific means of transport and are hard to implement and maintain. Therefore users waste money and time downloading several proprietary apps.

OpenMove moves from this troubled user experience, building an open platform suitable for every mean of transport and parking, making use of open data and releasing open APIs, with no extra fees. It fosters sustainable and multimodal mobility, aggregating different means of transport and parking and allowing users to pay for tickets with one simple tap.

Intended Outcome

OpenMove is a comprehensive solution for mobile ticketing with proper declinations towards final users (to provide them with the capability of purchasing electronic tickets) and Public Administrations (which need a complete and stable solution to handle mobile ticketing in terms of setup and accountability).

• Citizens are enabled to pay for all mobility services such as bus, train, subway and parking through the use of a mobile application freely available in the main markets. They may find trip information and handle their season tickets as well.

• Public Administrations have available a ready-to-use mobile ticketing solution for free: thanks to a powerful backoffice, they may plan mobility, elaborate statistics and manage accounting. Ticket inspectors easily verify travel tickets and parking.

Deployment is easy and quick: OpenMove makes use of open data for transportation (free and available in a standard format) and releases open APIs for mutual integration with third party solutions.

Relationship to PSI-Directive

(3) The development of new services based on novel ways to combine and make use of such information, stimulate economic growth and promote social engagement.

(5) To create news services and new applications, which are built upon the use, aggregation or combination of data.

Possible Approach

The app has a natural look and feel, is extremely intuitive to use and has multilanguage capabilities: it features an electronic wallet to be charged in several ways: credit card, PayPal and (as soon as they will reach significant marketshare) Google Wallet and Apple Pay. Credit cards are handled by a PCI-certified financial partner, allowing high security yet ease of use. Built-in algorithmic engine matches geolocalised users and public transport timetables or parking spots to recommend the right trip or park: it’s possible to buy single tickets, carnets and season tickets as well. Different fares for urban (calculated upon time), extra-urban (calculated upon distance) and parking areas are managed, even when there is no Internet connectivity, thanks to caching and realignment with our server. On board obliteration (when considered) is emulated simply yet effectively in two ways: buses are equipped with a NFC tag or QR Code sticked next to the ticket machine: people validate the ticket, approaching NFC-compatible smartphones or framing the QR Code with the smartphone camera.

The admin platform for Public Administrations allows to verify tickets sold in real time and elaborate statistics to plan urban and suburban mobility; OpenMove organise weekly financial statement and payment of the amount of tickets sold towards different mobility providers. We also deploy a web service with APIs layer for mutual integration with existing managing systems in use by providers.

Ticket inspectors verify easily and quickly tickets and parkings, thanks to a dedicated application. As for bus tickets, tickets show: origin and destination, obliteration timestamp, first name and last name of the user, optional rolling keyword, QR Code receipt with these data encrypted. The ticket inspector verifies at a glance above-mentioned information (displayed with animations and watermark to avoid illicit screenshots) or with a handheld device framing the QR Code receipt, which is instantly checked by the system. As for parking, we developed an OCR technology to instantly read car plates and check if parking is being regularly paid.

Compared with other mobile ticketing solutions, OpenMove features both technical and operational innovations. It is the only:

· Open and available for every mobility service (bus, train, subway, parking, etc.). This is crucial in order to reach critical mass of users and being acknowledged as the reference app for payment of transport tickets.

· Completely free solution for users and providers as well. Market solutions always come with fees to be paid both by final users and by providers. Particularly in this recession period, it is important for Public Administrations to count on a free ready-to-use solution they may adopt to offer a valuable service to their citizens.

· With a super fast deployment: while other solutions take months of work, the implementation of OpenMove takes literally just minutes, thanks to the standardisation – in technical and operational terms – promoted by the open data movement.

The philosophy of openness that drives OpenMove, i.e. to be an open platform making use of open data and releasing open APIs, is absolutely unique. We want to revolutionize current paradigms in mobile ticketing, catalysing the entire market in using our service.

How to Test

Test is made placing OpenMove side by side with traditional ticketing solutions.

Evidence

OpenMove is supported and funded by Finodex as one of the best applications making use of open data and using FiWare technology promoted by European Union (http://www.finodex-project.eu/content/italian-selected-teams)

OpenMove won EGS Mind the Bridge boo

Tags

mobile ticketing, smart cities, multimodal mobility, sustainable mobility, open platform

Status

Stable

Intended Audience

Public Administrations, transport companies, policy makers, business analysts, application developers

Related Best Practice

Contact

lorenzo.modena@openmove.com