FabMob partners with Flowbird to accelerate development of a national mobility platform in France
- The shared digital infrastructure enables secure, GDPR compliant sharing of user data
- Data can be used to motivate sustainable travel and inform mobility policy and funding
Press release, July 10, 2023, Paris:
La Fabrique des Mobilités (FabMob), a non-government organisation (NGO) enabling collaboration in the mobility sector, and Flowbird, a world leader in mobility technologies, today announce their partnership.
Together, the organisations will advance the “Mon Compte Mobilité” (moB) program for mobility users to access services, and collect and manage their mobility data.
“Put simply, moB is a national, account-based platform to encourage sustainable mobility,” says Ghislain Delabie, head of projects at FabMob, “It’s a single sign-on, online resource that individuals can use as an identity wallet to access sustainable transport services in France. In the same place, they can get personalised help and advice and discover new travel modes or bundled services. We envisage it as a way to raise awareness of available services, and to incentivise their use through transparent data and special fares and tariffs based on the user profile.”
The program plays a central role in FabMob’s mission to build a future of low-carbon mobility by removing some of the barriers to using shared transport and mobility. One of the hurdles has been the fragmented provision of services, which can be overcome by a digital ‘passport’ to all mobility services.
Collaboration drives innovation
Since 2015, FabMob has brought together public and private players, including technology suppliers, local authorities and research organisations, who share a common goal to reduce carbon emissions. Its aim is to work together to innovate systems that empower users to make greener travel choices.
In 2019, FabMob presented “Mon Compte Mobilité” (moB), a public-private partnership initiative, in response to a call for programs by the French Ecological Transition Agency (ADEME). Selected as a winning proposal, FabMob and its consortium (including a leading software engineering company) were given the green light in 2020 to begin implementation.
The secure, fully certified, open platform they have designed-and-built is now poised for growth. It offers national coverage to ridesharing operators, as part of a 150M€ plan to promote shared mobility through incentivisation. It can integrate, using standard APIs, with any third-party service (e.g. public transport, bike sharing, carpooling) and mobility applications (e.g. m-ticketing apps, MaaS apps).
After three years of program development including a year of experimentation, with the support of ADEME, the French Ministry of Transport, the French Transport Innovation Agency (AIT), and GART (the French Association of Transport Authorities), moB is now being used in three French cities and regions. Several more are expected to roll-out by the end of the year. FabMob is the principal operator of the service, as a neutral and nonprofit stakeholder.
To accelerate the program, Flowbird, headquartered in Neuilly Sur Seine, France, now joins the initiative. FabMob selected Flowbird as a partner to host and maintain the digital platform and ensure its continual improvement. Its decades of experience serving the mobility sector, its technical expertise, and its experience in software development, will be instrumental in driving the project forward.
Flowbird CEO, Frédéric Beylier, says: “At Flowbird, our mission is to make mobility effortless and we highly value our partnership with FabMob, which shares our vision. The moB platform responds to public interest, by making it seamless for individuals to travel more sustainably. For mobility operators, it’s easier to reach their audience and promote the full spectrum of their services. And, for government mobility agencies, it opens up a channel to drive behavioural change and meet their climate targets.”
Enriching quality of life
Both FabMob and Flowbird have a strong ambition to evolve a robust platform, which leverages data to benefit individual mobility users, and stakeholders involved in planning urban mobility services. For example, through connected services and apps, information on user behaviour can be used to support the roll-out of low emission zones; or to inform the funding and implementation of multimodal services.
Frédéric Laithier, product manager for Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) at Flowbird, has worked closely with the FabMob team. He says, “We’ve considered a number of strategic applications for the platform, which create economic and societal benefits. For instance, there will be an opportunity for employers to partner with moB, offering employees travel discounts that deliver value-for-money and motivate use of mobility services. This contributes to lower emissions, less congestion and cleaner air – improving ‘liveability’ in the area.”
“Flowbird will be an excellent partner for us,” says Ghislain Delabie, “We are at an exciting turning point for the mobility ecosystem, and it’s the optimum moment now to build trusted and shared digital services, which support public mobility policies, and which respect citizens’ rights to privacy.
“Together, we can move forward quickly to leverage this opportunity.”
About La Fabrique des Mobilités (FabMob)
La Fabrique des Mobilités (Fabmob) is a French non-profit organisation founded in 2015 by a coalition of key public and private mobility players. Its mission is to accelerate the transition to low carbon mobility through multi-stakeholder open cooperation projects and the promotion of Open Source resources.
www.lafabriquedesmobilites.fr Press contact: Julie Braka, julie@fabmob.io