Cubic Cuts Lisencing Deal With TfL, Can Sell Oyster Tech to other TAs

[Around the Horn]

An interesting development out of London:

 

The company that designed the Oyster Card for London's transit system can bring the technology to New York and other cities.

Transport for London on Wednesday cut a licensing deal with Cubic Transportation System — a contender to create a replacement for New York’s MetroCard — to spread the contactless fare payment system to transportation systems around the globe.

Cubic can now include the technology, which had been the property of London, in its bid to design a system that lets passengers use smartphones and cards to tap their way into a subway or bus.

 

Having technology with the Oyster Card capability will be a great improvement for New Yorkers,” said Mitchell Moss, director of the NYU Rudin Center for Transportation. “It’s got the benefits of being a well proven and well tested and refined.”

 

London was way ahead of major U.S. transit systems when it introduced the contactless Oyster Card fare payment system in 2003. The MTA expects to retire the MetroCard by 2022.

 

The tech deal is more than a boon for New York and other cities. London's new mayor is using the revenue from the agreement — worth up to 15 million pounds (or about $20 million) — to freeze TfL fares for the next four years.

“I made a firm commitment to sell Transport for London's expertise around the globe,” said London Mayor Sadiq Khan in a statement. “We will use the income from those deals for further investment in new infrastructure and to freeze TfL fares.”

 

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/london-contactless-oyster-card-replace-metrocard-article-1.2711096

 

 

The capital's new mayor has a plan to sell the contactless ticketing tech around the world.

The capital’s pioneering contactless payment system which has roots as far back as 2003, is now going global.

This morning Transport for London signed a deal with Cubic, the company they developed the underlying technology behind contactless ticketing with, to adapt and sell the tech around the world.

It’s all part of Sadiq Khan’s plan as the new Mayor of London to generate more money for TfL by selling their best practice to other transport hubs.

“I made a firm commitment to sell Transport for London’s expertise around the globe,” said Khan.

“We will use the income from those deals for further investment in new infrastructure and to freeze TfL fares”.

 

London’s golden ticket?

In London, Oyster and contactless ticketing has been a resounding success.

From 2012 the system was expanded to accept contactless bank cards and today these are accepted over the capital’s entire transport network.

In the last two years alone more than 500m journeys have been made with 12m credit and debit cards.

For TfL the sale of the contactless technology around the world is expected to bring in at least £15m, as their partner Cubic already has relationships with cities like Sydney, Brisbane, Vancouver and Chicago.

It won’t be bad for Londoners either however, as Khan has pledged to use the money to uphold his promise of freezing TfL fares until 2020.

http://www.thememo.com/2016/07/13/london-oyster-card-is-going-global-londons-tfl-transport-for-london/

 

This is an interesting idea. I'd love to see what East New York thinks of this development...

[bobtehpanda]

Considering it does everything the MTA wants (tap and go bank cards, etc.) this will be wonderful.

 

As long as they don't repeat the Ventra screwup...

[Around the Horn]

Considering it does everything the MTA wants (tap and go bank cards, etc.) this will be wonderful.

 

As long as they don't repeat the Ventra screwup...

That's exactly what I thought. Plus it's been tested already and has worked in a major world city for over ten years now.

 

 

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[RailRunRob]

Bingo! It's tried and true.