Next-gen ticketing gets $ from Ford (his great-grandson, anyway)

[CHamilton]

Bill Ford (yes, that Ford) invests in public transit, backing mobile ticketing firm Masabi

Given Detroit’s worship of the automobile, you wouldn’t think public transit would be high on its priority list, but on Wednesday transit ticketing startup Masabi revealed that one of the automotive industry’s most recognized names, Bill Ford, has taken a strategic and monetary interest in the company.

Bill Ford is, of course, the great-grandson of Henry Ford, and the executive chairman of the company that bears his name. ...
London-based Masabi said that the strategic investment is aimed at promoting its mobile ticketing technology to U.S. transit agencies, building off of its success in the U.K. (it has 13 transit contracts across the pond), and its recent deployment with Boston’s Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority. To date, the company claims it has processed $50 million in ticket sales worldwide and $3 million alone from the MBTA since its system went live in November.

Masabi’s key product is called JustRide, a cloud-based end-to-end ticketing platform that allows riders to purchase, manage and store transit tickets and passes in their mobile phones. Users can buy tickets from an app in their smartphones rather than wait in ticket lines. For train systems with conductors, the tickets show up as animated watermarks easily identified by ticket takers. For automated ticket systems, the app will display a QR code that will get you through the turnstile. Masabi is also upgrading its software to support near-field communications (NFC) in the future.

Boston, for instance, still utilizes smart card ticketing – which also can be linked to JustRide platform – but the gradual move of its smartphone-toting ridership to the cloud-based ticketing service saves it millions of dollars in ticketing machine and backend infrastructure.
...
As for Ford’s interest in public transit technologies, the chairman appears to be throwing his money in the same direction as his rhetoric. Ford has spoken several times about how, at the current rate of growth, the number of cars on the world’s highways would soon lead to massive congestion problems. His proposed answer is coordination between public transit and intelligent traffic management systems to better control of the flow of billions of people as they go about their daily lives.

 

[The Davy Crockett]

...Ford has spoken several times about how, at the current rate of growth, the number of cars on the world’s highways would soon lead to massive congestion problems. His proposed answer is coordination between public transit and intelligent traffic management systems to better control of the flow of billions of people as they go about their daily lives.

Charlie, Thanks for sharing! :hi:

The fact that this is Henry Ford's great-grandson - and thus only three generations removed from the person who made the automobile available to the masses - is a graphic reminder of just how much the world has changed in a very short period of time.

On another, but closely related note, I can't help and read the above quote and not add the observation that while congestion is certainly a real growing global problem, the underlying basis for this problem are the costs - financial and other - of having cars as the primary method of transport for the world's billions. We simply can't afford it.

 

[CHamilton]

On another, but closely related note, I can't help and read the above quote and not add the observation that while congestion is certainly a real growing global problem, the underlying basis for this problem are the costs - financial and other - of having cars as the primary method of transport for the world's billions. We simply can't afford it.

Very true. And getting an accurate picture of the real costs is difficult, since so many of them are "externalities" that don't factor in to the bottom line very well.

 

[jis]

On another, but closely related note, I can't help and read the above quote and not add the observation that while congestion is certainly a real growing global problem, the underlying basis for this problem are the costs - financial and other - of having cars as the primary method of transport for the world's billions. We simply can't afford it.

I believe that the over-dependancy on cars is a uniquely American problem. Countries that do have the billions of population, which the US does not, have for decades aggressively invested in all modes of transport including rasil. And even then all modes including rail are congested.
The root cause of congestion is growth of population and the growth in ownership of the means and wherewithall for people to travel more by all modes. Cars are just a part of the problem. not all of it.

Another part of the problem is inefficient use of rail, which is emblematic in the US. Most Americans would not even consider the possibility of the type of density of passengers in trains that is common in countries that truly have billions of people. Amtrak's (and even most commuter agency's) energy efficiency is abysmal when compared to most other countries in the world. The true effective capacity of the NEC is nowhere near being exhausted while we are talking of spending tens of billions of dollars to increase capacity, and yet we cannot spend a few hundred million to get enough rolling stock to make full use of the already available capacity. So go figure.

 

[RichardK]

I have always been a fan of the Ford Motor Company. In fact, I have owned 8 Fords in my time.

Under the leadership of Bill Ford (William Clay Ford) they have become very environmentally responsible. He has said many times that, not only the U.S., but many other countries just cannot support the auto as their main means of intercity transportation. Roads cannot be built fast enough.

Sometimes he has been at odds with other management personnel, which includes other Ford family members. The Ford family owns all of the preferred voting stock.

Bill has always viewed himself as the "green" executive.

 

[leemell]

So what if you don't have a smart phone? Any reasonable efficient alternatives built in to the system?