Starting today, we’re introducing universal micromobility scanners in all of our global rollouts. The first of its kind, the universal scanner function unlocks every micromobility vehicle connected to the Trafi platform. It’s accessible right from the homescreen and lets users access any vehicle they choose, irrespective of provider.
Additionally, we’ve launched the two-tap trip experience and improved vehicle discoverability on the map.
In this day and age, users expect nothing less than perfectly convenient digital experiences, and at Trafi, we pride ourselves on our ability to meet these rapidly evolving demands. The global apps powered by our technology have an average rating of 4.5 stars, similar only to Uber and other leading mobility apps.
The introduction of the universal scanner is the result of our determination to match the full experience of native micromobility apps and to continue our mission of pushing the mobility-tech envelope.
The universal scanner unlocks any integrated vehicle that supports QR codes.
It works like this: users open their Trafi-powered MaaS app – yumuv or Jelbi, for example – when standing in front of a vehicle they’d like to ride. (It doesn’t matter what sharing company the vehicle belongs to.) The user opens the homescreen of the app and then taps the “scanner” button. The scanner appears on the screen and the user points their smartphone at the QR code located on the top of the vehicle. The QR code is then automatically scanned and unlocked, and the user can hop on the vehicle and get moving.
It sounds as easy as it is. After scanning their vehicle of choice, users only have to tap their screens twice more: once to start their ride, and once to end their journey. We call that the “two-tap trip” experience.
This deceptively simple update is helpful to riders for obvious reasons. Not only does it match the riding experience provided by native apps, but it also opens access to multiple providers’ services.
It has an added bonus for micromobility service providers as well. Trafi’s universal scanner lets them expand and deploy new additions to their fleets quickly and easily – no need for complicated unlocking mechanisms.
One of the benefits of MaaS networks is the wide variety of mobility options they make available to users. More options let users weigh the benefits and compare the mobility modes available to them before deciding which one suits them best.
We take the desire to compare options into account at Trafi. Upon opening the homescreen map, all micromobility options in the user’s vicinity are clearly shown. (That also includes new icons that indicate the battery levels of each vehicle.)
When the user taps the “nearby” screen, they’re shown vehicles that have enough battery power to cover the average trip. (That’s roughly 3 kilometers for scooters, and up to 6 kilometers for e-bikes.) An ideal walking path and distance needed to reach that vehicle are immediately pre-selected and presented to the user as well. All guesswork is eliminated for ease of convenience.
By introducing universal scanners and improving discoverability in our apps, users gain back valuable time and the usability and flexibility of the app increases in the process. At Trafi, we strive to improve and develop our tech with these parameters in mind. It’s our goal to make MaaS so easy to use, it becomes the first choice of every urban mobility user of the future.
When we launched Jelbi in Berlin last year we were faced with a challenge to handle radically different mobility services within a single European city. Now we can say with certainty that it was a huge achievement not only for all of us at Trafi but for the mobility industry as a whole. Nevertheless, the only way for us to top it was to take on an even more complex, multi-city mobility network and make it even better. This week we are presenting you with yumuv – world’s first regional Mobility as a Service with subscriptions. Owned by Swiss Federal Railways (SBB CFF FFS), public transport operators (PTOs) in Zurich (VBZ), Basel (BVB), and Bern (BERNMOBIL), and powered by Trafi.
Of all countries embracing public transportation as the backbone of urban mobility, Switzerland stands second to none. From their synchronized scheduling of all forms of public transportation to their unified ticketing system, this mountain nation is an example where even the most affluent people rely on public transportation every single day. Thus, when we took the task of launching yumuv, we didn’t flinch in basing the whole product experience in public transportation. It only makes sense when you have such a firm ground to stand on.
However, using public transportation to move between Zurich, Basel, and Bern is not the same as relying on shared mobility inside the cities. Our lives are too chaotic to expect public transportation to cover all our use cases. Nevertheless, instead of falling back to owning private cars, the younger generation is getting their driver’s licenses later, if at all. According to one study done in Geneva, the home to the world-famous auto show, driver’s licenses issued to people under 25 years went from 75% 18 years ago to 65% in 2017. It shows a trend that younger Swiss citizens want to incorporate shared mobility services into their daily lives. For us, this was a clear confirmation that we had to completely integrate well-known micromobility brands like Tier, Voi, and BOND into a single, holistic multimodal service.
So, the takeaway here: no single provider, operator, or solution could have made all of this happen. Moreover, it would be impossible to have a successful Mobility as a Service without taking the already excellent public transportation backbone and enhancing it with trusted mobility service providers (MSPs). And for a project like yumuv to work at all, you have to have a single joint regional entity to orchestrate Mobility as a Service for and between three Swiss cities.
A multi-city approach
For a country the size of Switzerland, where you usually commute to work, school or university from another city or village, can reach your downtown in mere minutes and have immediate access to the Alps, we chose a different focal point: a completely regional, multi-city experience is more important than integrating complete intracity mobility of just one city.
Micromobility supplements public transportation
We still hear hypotheticals how micromobility should complement public transportation. Meanwhile, yumuv is pushing the envelope from day one and connects these modes seamlessly: there can be no first and last-mile solutions, if electric bikes and kick scooters are not readily available in the same place you plan your public transportation trips, and vice versa.
Mobility subscriptions
Most Swiss citizens have public transportation passes, and this suggested that extending them with mobility subscriptions for micromobility was the natural way to go. With yumuv, people can pay a flat rate for rides with electric bikes and kick scooters. This mechanism ensures that they can have a cheaper and smoother exploration of new mobility options.
Taking data privacy seriously
With yumuv, we also follow our own principle of personal data privacy being a human right. There is no better way to deliver on this deeply held conviction than to create a product that is fully functional even if travelers don’t want to share their location data either with our platform, or our partners. Certain features become less helpful but people can still effortlessly look for options that make the most sense for their situation.
Customizable off-the-shelf solution
Finally, for us at Trafi it’s very special that yumuv is sharing the same robust technology we use to power Jelbi and our other MaaS cities. Of course, we had to adjust and customize for Swiss regional specifics. However, our core functionality remains intact and is shared across other Mobility as a Service solutions, allowing for easier rollouts of upcoming features.
In other words, with yumuv, Mobility as a Service is entering its Act II. The launch of a completely integrated holistic multimodal service for a single city was exciting, but it was only the setup. Now, focusing on a multi-city regional approach and creating a single payment option like subscriptions opens new, yet to-be-explored avenues.
Founded in Vilnius, Lithuania, Trafi has been revolutionizing urban mobility since 2013. Our MaaS platform is designed to run even the most complex transport systems and has been trusted by Berlin (BVG), Brussels (STIB), Portsmouth & Southampton (Solent Transport), Munich (MVG), and Zurich (SBB).
Trafi’s mission is to empower cities with state-of-the-art MaaS solution that helps to tackle their mobility challenges and to achieve ambitious sustainability objectives. Our white-label product offers all the features and components needed to launch your own-branded MaaS service. With more than 50 existing deep integrations to mobility service providers and payment facilitators, we help to reduce risk, cost, and time-to-launch for new services.
Intermodal trips look like a saving grace in getting people out of their cars. Aurelija Petrauskytė-Latakė — Trafi’s Lead Product Manager for Routing — dispels the complex nature of intermodality and explains why people find it challenging to rely upon it.
Imagine that you are having coffee with a friend near Potsdamer Platz in Berlin on a lovely Saturday morning. Your friend gets an idea to visit the Zoo, and you don’t hesitate to agree. Now, if you were Anna, a Berliner through-and-through, you would walk. It’s 46 minutes, a beautiful route, and she enjoys a pleasant stroll while catching up on her podcasts. However, if you were Peter, an ex-pat, you would prefer convenience while being very price sensitive. In other words, you would take a bus. Would getting caught in the rain change anything? Anna most likely would immediately jump into a shared car and go back home. For Peter, however, nothing would change: it’s price over comfort pretty much always, and it’s charming when it rains.
These are typical mobility deliberations we all make every single day. What we are considering — taking a bus, car, or walking — are routes from point A to point B. Every route has an origin, a destination, a mobility mode, a path, and a cost. Anna doesn’t mind the physical cost of walking because she finds standing on a platform or inside a train annoying. Peter, however, is willing to pay for the convenience of public transport above the physical toll of walking. You, however, would likely have a different attitude. We all are different people with distinct preferences in disparate situations.
The takeaway: no route is absolutely right for everyone. Every option we take is a tradeoff against the existing alternatives.
Say that Anna, Peter, and you are relying on the same trip planner to find your mobility options. Well, then the routing software that powers any trip planner would have to know, accept, and adhere to your differences and return a set of mobility options that would make sense specifically to you and your situation. Honestly, every trip planner faces a challenge to achieve that.
There is a solution, though: every one of us, including Anna, Peter and you, consider wait time, trip price, duration, distance, etc. What makes us all different are the distinct values we assign to shared preferences: Anna is more tolerant of walking, and Peter is more tolerant of public transport. I, for example, maybe am more tolerant of paying for ride-hailing. Keep in mind that these tolerance levels also are sensitive to context: whether it’s raining or if it’s rush hour, whether you’re carrying grocery bags or just running late — we all tend to reconsider our usual choices if the situation changes. Routing software would have to start exactly here: by embedding this shared set of preferences and assigning tolerance levels specific to people, cities, and even context.
In other words, trip planners have to consider our shared preferences and return a list of routes that make sense to our tolerance levels in any given situation.
Anna and Peter’s options look like a walk in the park in comparison with intermodal routes, e.g., combining a shared mobility option with a public transport one. Imagine that for that trip to Berlin’s Zoo; you decide to take the intermodal route recommended by your trip planner: a TIER kick scooter with a transfer to U-Bahn №2.
What follows is the actual sequence of actions you would be required to perform in an intermodal trip. First, your find a scooter, walk to the scooter, unlock the scooter, put on a helmet, ride the scooter from Potsdamer Platz to Mendelssohn-Bartholdy-Park station for 5 minutes, confirm that you can lock the scooter, take off the helmet, lock the scooter, enter the station and find the platform, wait 6 minutes, transfer to U-Bahn №2, ride five stops for ten more minutes, and complete your last mile on foot.
That’s 23 minutes and around 5 euros. Slower than car-sharing or even a bus but, probably, more convenient than walking. But for this trip to even be recommended, a trip planner has to perform some severe behind-the-scenes calculations:
1. Evaluate the amount of effort you are willing to invest in this route, i.e., tolerance limit to walking, tolerance limit to driving yourself, tolerance to switch from a self-driven mode to a mode where you are driven, tolerance to wait for a transfer, etc.
2. Evaluate mobility service availability, i.e., inquire all integrated shared and public mobility providers in real-time about their available supply, so that you would be able to unlock a kick scooter to start the trip, and a transfer to U-Bahn at your connection point without the necessity to wait for a long time,
3. Predict upfront, i.e., combining the availability and your tolerance levels, calculate how far into the future this trip can be guaranteed, as the scooter supply changes constantly, they cannot be reserved indefinitely. At the same time, U-Bahn №2 does run on a schedule, but it does get disrupted sometimes, and you still have to make your connection at a specific time.
In other words, a trip planner has to recommend intermodal routes that make sense: provide options that show a tradeoff between price, the effort needed, and time saved. But even then, one person will find paying 5 euros for a 23-minute trip outrageous while another would be less concerned about price. Moreover, people are also less likely to consider taking intermodal routes where they are not guaranteed supply at transfer stations.
One of the points that tend to get lost in the whole debate about the future of urban mobility is the cognitive complexity of intermodal routes. As we’ve discussed before, people calculate tradeoffs. Risks of not finding a kick scooter, riding on unknown streets amid the car traffic, the possibility of missing your U-Bahn connection — it all adds up to an apparent reason why Anna and Peter will mostly prefer sticking to their regularly scheduled options in the upcoming future.
Nevertheless, for most people, sticking only to scarce public transport or private cars is not an answer either. We must increase the connectivity of the whole urban mobility network. Intermodal trips seem to be a legitimate way to get there. One immediate example is urban park & ride systems that allow commuters to leave their cars and switch to public transport or micro-mobility.
To put a finer point here: intermodal routes are already being suggested. In Berlin, Jelbi — a city-led MaaS platform — recommends taking at least one shared mobility combination with public transport in every tenth route search request. However, guaranteeing intermodality is still very complex: these routes have to deal with far more variables than distinctly public transport or shared mobility ones.
One can only hope that intermodal variability can be handled by an abundance of micro-mobility supply soon. Until then, it’s only natural that for regular people, intermodality is rarely the preferred option.
Founded in Vilnius, Lithuania, Trafi has been revolutionizing urban mobility since 2013. Our MaaS platform is designed to run even the most complex transport systems and has been trusted by Berlin (BVG), Brussels (STIB), Portsmouth & Southampton (Solent Transport), Munich (MVG), and Zurich (SBB).
Trafi’s mission is to empower cities with state-of-the-art MaaS solution that helps to tackle their mobility challenges and to achieve ambitious sustainability objectives. Our white-label product offers all the features and components needed to launch your own-branded MaaS service. With more than 50 existing deep integrations to mobility service providers and payment facilitators, we help to reduce risk, cost, and time-to-launch for new services.
Navigating cities has become an extremely complicated task. MaaS promises to guide travelers effortlessly through the so-called jungle of the urban mobility network. One of the severe challenges that stands in the way of living up to this promise is disruptions, which happen on a daily basis, especially in larger cities. The majority of urban dwellers can relate to being extremely frustrated by being late to work because of a disrupted line. In these situations, what travelers need the most are guidance and reassurance.
At Trafi, we took this challenge very seriously — to provide top-notch real-time disruption updates, to allow travelers to plan their door-to-door trips effortlessly even when disruptions occur. Firstly, we analyzed the currently available disruption services on the market and identified multiple problems, and then attempted to tackle them.
Based on these observations, we designed a solution to tackle these problems heads on.
Types of alerts sent to travelers:
The most granular disturbances on a direction and stop level for planned and unplanned disruptions.
Planned disruption information comes from the official Public Transport Authority (PTA) sources that we receive through API. Trafi’s system sends automatic updates every 5 minutes, checking for the newest information from the PTA source. E.g. canceled bus line, change of route length, etc. Our system indicates not only that there is a disruption per route level, but also indicated it for a particular disrupted direction (track) for each schedule, meaning that users who are traveling in another direction on the same affected route are not bothered or misled by redundant information.
Unplanned disruption updates are derived from real-time mobility situations. Let’s say that there is a major congestion due to a huge storm. As a result, four busses are stuck and have not been able to move for the past 35 minutes. Thanks to real-time vehicle tracking, Trafi will spot this and immediately send a disruption alert.
For example, Berliners are warned about all service disruptions in one place -the BVG Jelbi app-, including U-Bahn, BVG buses, BVG trams, and S-Bahn disruptions, which cover 95% of the total annual public transport passenger traffic. And soon we will reach 100 % of trip coverage.
Trafi prepared a toolset for cities to publish disruptions manually to cover all possible cases.
Official sources do not always provide all the disruption information and sometimes it requires adding them manually. The lockdown situation during COVID-19 proved that changes for public transport were made quicker than updates were available in official sources. E.g. information such as front bus doors won’t be used to enter a bus anymore, or that it is required to wear a mask if a passenger wants to enter the vehicle were not part of official disruptions but yet highly important for people to know.
Our proprietary tool allows MaaS operators to manually post disruption information: not only by writing a message but also marking what lines, schedules, directions, or stops were affected and how.
The disruption function is now live in the BVG Jelbi app powered by Trafi. The ability to provide the most accurate and granular public transport disruption information sets Trafi apart. But we do not stop here, we strive for the best support of the travelers, thus next we are working on:
– Informing users on the way. E.g. if a traveler is on the way and disruption happens that affects their journey, they will be informed.
– Supporting replanning of the trip to navigate around disruptions. In addition to suggesting another public transport route, we plan to help people discover other modes, and intermodal routes to reach their destination on time.
Founded in Vilnius, Lithuania, Trafi has been revolutionizing urban mobility since 2013. Our MaaS platform is designed to run even the most complex transport systems and has been trusted by Berlin (BVG), Brussels (STIB), Portsmouth & Southampton (Solent Transport), Munich (MVG), and Zurich (SBB).
Trafi’s mission is to empower cities with state-of-the-art MaaS solution that helps to tackle their mobility challenges and to achieve ambitious sustainability objectives. Our white-label product offers all the features and components needed to launch your own-branded MaaS service. With more than 50 existing deep integrations to mobility service providers and payment facilitators, we help to reduce risk, cost, and time-to-launch for new services.
Imagine that instead of owning the key that unlocks your personal car, you are handed a personal key to any given vehicle. This is where the promise of Mobility as a Service (MaaS) lies — a seamless access point to the complete mobility spectrum.
MaaS is not just a novel and convenient way for travelers to move within and beyond cities. It’s also the most promising alternative to the private cars which cities seek to push out.
The concept of MaaS also carries a lot of misconceptions. In this white paper, we aim to dispel the fog with what we call the Mobility as a Service fundamentals that are the key to unjamming urban mobility.
Founded in Vilnius, Lithuania, Trafi has been revolutionizing urban mobility since 2013. Our MaaS platform is designed to run even the most complex transport systems and has been trusted by Berlin (BVG), Brussels (STIB), Portsmouth & Southampton (Solent Transport), Munich (MVG), and Zurich (SBB).
Trafi’s mission is to empower cities with state-of-the-art MaaS solution that helps to tackle their mobility challenges and to achieve ambitious sustainability objectives. Our white-label product offers all the features and components needed to launch your own-branded MaaS service. With more than 50 existing deep integrations to mobility service providers and payment facilitators, we help to reduce risk, cost, and time-to-launch for new services.
MUNICH — Münchner Verkehrsgesellschaft (MVG), the main public transport company in Munich, has chosen Trafi, the technology platform, to release a city-owned Mobility as a Service solution. The application will be available to users in the course of the year and will include the full public transportation network as well as private providers, thus connecting traditional and new mobility.
After initiating the expansion and the modernization of its public transportation fleets, the MVG has been equally proactive in launching its own bike-sharing and ride pooling services. The Münchner Verkehrsgesellschaft is also behind the M-Login, which allows all Munich inhabitants and visitors alike to use various digital services around the Bavarian capital with one account only. As a next logical step, the MVG is now launching its own Mobility-as-a-Service solution.
With only one app to download for their various mobility needs, the inhabitants of Munich will be able to conveniently book their preferred modes — and discover new ways to get around their beloved city, driving the switch from private to shared mobility.
In addition to the traditional public transit offer, all mobility providers of the city can be integrated. The potential future partners were formally invited to an information session organized by the MVG to learn all about the plan to launch MaaS in the city. Participants included Bird, BOND Mobility, Circ, CleverShuttle, Dott, emmy, IsarFunk, Taxi Zentrale, mtz (münchner taxi zentrum), SHARE NOW, Sixt, STATTAUTO München, Taxi München eG, TIER Mobility, and VOI.
“We network the various providers under one roof in order to sensibly supplement public transport as the backbone of mobility, and to make sharing vehicles of all sizes even better and easier,” says Mayor Dieter Reiter.
“Sharing is part of our DNA as a public transport operator. The MVG’s current goal is to also cover the first and last mile by cooperating with new partners and offers. Our customers want to reach their destination from and to their front door, and not just from stop to stop,” says Ingo Wortmann, Chairman of the Management Board at MVG.
“We want to create more mobility in Munich, but also less car traffic,” adds Sinaida Cordes, Head of Innovation Projects at MVG. “We are delighted to play a pioneering role in driving this change.”
“This new partnership between Trafi and MVG is an encouraging signal that an increasing number of cities want to connect their whole mobility networks to create a seamless experience for their users. After launching the largest MaaS solution in the world in Berlin, we are thrilled to join forces with Munich in our quest to create cities where moving is easy,” says Christof Schminke, Managing Director Commercial at Trafi.
Founded in Vilnius, Lithuania, Trafi has been revolutionizing urban mobility since 2013. Our MaaS platform is designed to run even the most complex transport systems and has been trusted by Berlin (BVG), Brussels (STIB), Portsmouth & Southampton (Solent Transport), Munich (MVG), and Zurich (SBB).
Trafi’s mission is to empower cities with state-of-the-art MaaS solution that helps to tackle their mobility challenges and to achieve ambitious sustainability objectives. Our white-label product offers all the features and components needed to launch your own-branded MaaS service. With more than 50 existing deep integrations to mobility service providers and payment facilitators, we help to reduce risk, cost, and time-to-launch for new services.
