Italian Mobility as a Service and smart ticketing platform OpenMove were part of the frontierCities2 stand in the Start-Up Hall at Intertraffic 2018. Four years and a global pandemic later they have honed and tailored their solution, all the while patently aware that at the end of the day it’s a question of trust between the provider and the user.
“We’ve been looking forward to this show for two years,” says CEO Lorenzo Modena. “Being here and interacting is something that we really needed to do. We sell B2B solutions to large companies and in order to do that you need to build relationships and it’s just not possible to do that with someone that you have never met in person. This is really important for us.”
OpenMove specializes in providing an account-based ticketing system, booking and demand-responsive transport, passenger information, fleet management and a Mobility as a Service platform and Modena explains that OpenMove delivers products that play a pivotal role in user experience so it’s equally important for he and his colleagues at the show, COO Alessandro Sosi and Sales Manager Elena Ziller to be able to “demonstrate how people interact with their smartphone or how our customers’ on-field personnel interact with their devices as this is something we can really only do in person. It’s how you build trust.”
As Alessandro Sosi explains, OpenMove is essentially an ITS provider in terms of ticketing and infomobiity booking systems as well as a MaaS provider.
“For a public transport operator we give them a completely holistic view of mobility – we start with a specific territory and put together every available transport mode for which we provide all the technology layers to enable them to offer a single mobility platform that can be accessed with a mobile phone.”
The account-based ticketing system allows single sales capabilities across mulitple mobility channels, as well as a comprehensive set of tools for field personnel, including:
For a company such as OpenMove, their first solo outing at Intertraffic affords them the opportunity to promote their solutions to an enormous (and captive) audience the size and scope of which is unrivalled anywhere else on the planet but what would make Modena consider this to have been a most satisfying week when he and his colleagues are packing their stand away on Friday afternoon?
“For us we can meet new customers, potential new partners, strengthen existing relationships – visitors can get a fresh, new perspective on what we are offering and we can get the same from potential partners. Some people visit our stand with very specific ideas and we see if we can match them. We show them some demos and let them decide if we are the right platform for them. We aren’t here to sell things or impress people,” he maintains. “What we provide is at the very core of our customers’ daily operation so it’s not something we can really push. We have to wait for them to tell us their specific needs and requirements to be welcomed into their operations.”
Trust is clearly a subject that is one of OpenMove’s core values and that fits very neatly into one of the company’s current projects, a UITP MaaS Ticketing working group that focuses on trust.
“Trust and a relationship with end users, the travellers, is the key for technology to provide information and access to mobility options. This show, for us, is as much a trust-building exercise as anything else.”
