smartmachine launches first project in public transport
State-of-the-art mobile ticketing and validation backend for Orange Romania and Bucharest subway
With 28th of June, 2010, Metrorex, operator of the Bucharest subway system, enabled the first mobile ticketing system within the Romanian transport industry. The solution is promoted by Orange Romania, market leading mobile network provider with about 11 M subscribers. smartmachine –supported by its local partner Conquistador - is providing some core components for running this innovative service: tickets with 2-dimensional barcodes are created by the "Mobile Content Handler" platform, which is directly linked to Orange’s mobile ordering and payment system, where clients of the network can acquire tickets for the metro. All they have to do is send any text to specific short codes – depending on the number of rides included on the ticket the enduser price is different. "We are delighted to announce our partnership with smartmachine for deploying this mobile payment project. Starting from the initial 2-weeks trial experiment the whole system has been fully integrated and proved everyone that new mobile-based technologies could be an important alternative for the existing payment and metro access means", says Gabriela Voinea, Senior Product Manager at Orange Romania.
Clients can benefit twice, as every buyer of a ticket will get a 24 mobile web access for free. The fee for the ride will be deducted from the mobile phone bill directly or from the pre-paid account.
Once the payment is confirmed, the client will receive an MMS with a unique barcode. The ticket check is done within smartmachine’s new "smart Validation System" (smartVS), which controls the reading devices almost fully remotely and manages the access to the station via 3G connection. The scanners, which also allow direct interaction with a functional client display and pin pad, are currently installed in six stops of the subway system, but it is planned to reach a full coverage by beginning of 2011.
For any issues the client might have when ordering or using the Mobile Ticket, smartmachine is also providing an online tracking and reporting tool, supporting the operations of the trial with real time access for Call Center agents to usage history, allowing quick resends in case the client has deleted the ticket by mistake and clearing statistics.
„We are more than happy that our first fully operational installation in Romania’s public transport industry is backed by the market leading network operator. The full utilization of their client base and their existing system infrastructure will surely raise adoption rate for this innovative service", says Thomas Wiedner, responsible for Business Development at smartmachine.
