User Group Meeting and anniversary: Highlights in INIT's anniversary year

On the first day, at its headquarters. INIT presented a wide range of products, which allowed customers to experience many of the systems and to talk to INIT experts. Two days of presentations then provided deeper insight into topics such as incident management and passenger information, occupancy rate predictions, ticketing, interoperability and electromobility. As with previous User Group Meetings, the best practice customer reports were particularly appreciated.

Christian Höglmeier, CTO of co-host VBK Verkehrsbetriebe Karlsruhe GmbH and AVG Albtal-Verkehrs-Gesellschaft mbH, spoke about digital transformation at the Karlsruhe public transport providers. He showed how VBK and AVG are shaping digitalisation and what advantages this has for passengers, but also for the increased efficiency of transport operations.

INIT’s system RESPONSEassist also offers advantages for passengers and the efficiency of transport companies. Frank Bergmann, Quality Assurance and Training Officer at WSW mobil GmbH in Wuppertal, spoke about this when he explained how – with a few clicks – dispatchers in Wuppertal can process incidents, inform passengers simultaneously via all available channels and document incidents.

RESPONSEassist will also be used by Magdeburger Verkehrsbetriebe GmbH & Co. KG. Robert Tecklenburg, Head of IT Core Systems, reported on this outlook as well as on the migration of on-board computers to the latest generation. With the newly implemented  COPILOTapp on-board computer app, which has also been introduced, subcontractor vehicles in rail replacement services, among others, can now obtain smart devices as on-board computers and therefore be integrated into the ITCS.

Of course, not every project runs smoothly from the outset. Stefan Glinschert, Head of Operations and Operations Manager (Betriebsleiter BoKraft) at Verkehrsgesellschaft Hameln-Pyrmont (VHP) mbH, spoke about the experiences that VHP gained during the tendering process and how the project finally became a success with the rapid implementation of INIT's Intermodal Transport Control System MOBILE-ITCS nextGen.

Verkehr und Wasser GmbH (VWG) in Oldenburg has become a pioneer in the field of occupancy predictions with the introduction of MOBILEguide, which Morell Predoehl, Head of Marketing and Sales, spoke about. He explained how passengers and the transport company itself can benefit from knowing passenger occupancy levels.

A trendsetter in ticketing is the public transport system Föli in the Finnish city of Turku. Here, passengers can pay with the company's own closed-loop Föli Card, with a credit card or smartphone and are guaranteed to pay the lowest fare. This system was presented by Topias Pihlava, Development Manager at the City of Turku.