The second cohort of the Billion Journey Project has culminated with our second Demo Day at White City, London on Wednesday 23rd January 2019. The ten innovative companies once again took to the stage to share the work they have delivered as proofs of concept for the Go-Ahead Group during the programme. We are very excited to announce that we will be initially working with eight of those brilliant companies going forward, and they are:
• Axon Vibe – A smart journey planning service that provides personalised real-time transport updates across a range of modes of transport
• FAIRTIQ – A smartphone-based contactless ticketing service that allows passengers to use a variety of transport on a sole virtual pass
• Route Reports – An intelligent service enabling transport operators to monitor road conditions, onboard environments and passenger numbers
• Ordoo – A mobile phone ordering app that allows customers to order and pay for food and drink ahead of their arrival, saving time and offering personalised loyalty rewards
• Citi Logik– An information service that helps passengers understand how busy their services are likely to be both before and after their boarding
• iGeolise – API that makes location-based data searchable by travel time rather than distance
• Enterprise Bot – An artificial intelligence platform that can resolve roughly 60% of inbound customer enquiries
• Dovu – A blockchain based rewards system that allows passengers to redeem tokens earned by using public transport services
Axon Vibe was crowned the winner of the cohort by the judges, while FAIRTIQ came up trumps in a vote among participants. Connell from Route Reports recieved a special award on the night in memory of Phil Margrave. The award is given to someone who has excelled whilst part of the programme, Connell was the perfect recipient.
The event kicked off with an outstanding keynote by Rory Sutherland (UK vice-chairman Ogilvy), who’s left field perspectives helped get the audience into the spirit of thinking differently. The evening then included a great selection of grub from the UK’s top street food vendors, drinks and numerous networking opportunities.
The announcement marks the culmination of an eight-week process, which saw participants provided with unparalleled access to senior people across rail and bus and included access to Go-Ahead data, insights from industry experts and office space.
The Billion Journey Project is unique in the transport industry and is part of Go-Ahead’s efforts to improve the customer experience by engaging with exciting companies to deliver innovative solutions.
Previous winners have included Airportr, which allows airline passengers to check in their baggage from home which will be launching a partnership with Govia Thameslink Railway in 2019.
David Brown, Go-Ahead Group CEO, handing over the Phil Margrave award to Connell from Route Reports
The accelerator also generated a “life-changing” app for disabled transport users, Transreport, which went on to win a contract for national rollout across the UK’s railways in 2018 through the Rail Delivery Group.
David Brown, Go-Ahead Group Chief Executive, said, “I am delighted that Go-Ahead is working with these great innovators to deliver exciting new services and benefits for passengers across our rail and bus services. With our passengers taking over one billion journeys a year, it is important that we are always looking at how we can better meet and exceed their changing needs. The quality of the businesses we have worked with through the Billion Journey Project has been was extremely high, and I hope it is a great indication of where the future of the transport industry is headed.”
Over the coming weeks, we will be sharing a number of updates on the whole Billion Journey Project alumni as they begin to roll out their innovative solutions to our customers and businesses in 2019. These programmes as just the beginning of the journey and are a demonstration of our ongoing commitment to ensure Go-Ahead and its operating companies are keeping innovation as a top priority.
