This award pays tribute to Vodafone Germany and DB Mobility Networks Logistics' pioneering joint project for public transport users
Düsseldorf, 18 November 2008. A jury consisting of members of the business and scientific communities presented the ÖPNV Innovation Award to Vodafone Germany and DB for their Touch&Travel joint venture at the 13th IIR ÖPNV Congress CiTOP 2008 in Berlin. The ÖPNV Innovation Award is sponsored by IIR Deutschland GmbH in cooperation with the Nahverkehrspraxis magazine and it pays tribute to innovative products or concepts with a promising future for the public transport sector.
The business and scientific jury decided to present the award to Touch&Travel because of the concept itself and because it would be easy to transfer to other transport companies. When they get on board, passengers with NFC-capable handsets register the start of their journey at the touch points and when they get off at the end of their journey, they follow the same procedure. The data about the start and finish of the journey is used to calculate the ticket price, which is then displayed on the mobile phone. The objective of the project is to reduce access barriers and make public transport more attractive by launching a novel, easy-to-use and customer-friendly e-ticketing system.
Touch&Travel has been running as a pilot project since February 2008. It will be continued with up to 2,500 test customers in the second flight of the pilot project. Dr. Karl-Friedrich Rausch, Public Transport Director, said, "This award confirms that we are first movers in the innovative e-ticketing field with Touch&Travel. It's convenient and practical for our customers to use and it also makes economic sense for our transport partners."
Touch&Travel is a joint project of DB Mobility Logistics AG, Vodafone D2 GmbH and T-Mobile Deutschland GmbH, in collaboration with Berliner Verkehrsbetrieben AöR (BVG), Verkehrsbetrieb Potsdam GmbH (ViP) and other technology partners.
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Dirk Ellenbeck, External Communications, T: +49 211 533-6912
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Vodafone Germany is one of the largest and most modern telecommunications providers in Europe. It realises turnover of more than EUR 10 billion and has 15,000 employees. In conjunction with its full subsidiary Arcor AG & Co KG, Vodafone Germany is an integrated technology and service provider with a portfolio including mobile communications, fixed network telephony, internet and broadband data services for business and private customers. Continuous development, numerous patents and investments in new products, services and the modern network have made Vodafone an innovation leader in the German telecommunications market. Vodafone Deutschland is headquartered in Düsseldorf and Arcor in Eschborn near Frankfurt. Vodafone and Arcor are committed to CSR and they also support numerous projects through the German Vodafone Foundation.
The companies are part of the Vodafone Group. Visit the websites at www.vodafone.de und www.arcor.de for further information.