Alta and 8D Technologies announce new partnership for bikeshare systems

[PotomacCyclist]

A new article about Bruno Rodi, the new owner of PBSC Urban Solutions (the former Bixi International division, which markets bikeshare equipment to cities around the world):

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/business/pedaling-uphill-to-save-a-bike-share-pioneer.html

The Uphill Push to Save a Bike-Share Pioneer
By IAN AUSTENJAN. 9, 2015

In one of his first moves, Mr. Rodi hired nearly two dozen developers to fix PBSC’s software problems and then to bring the system into the age of the mobile Internet. He is also crisscrossing the globe to find new customers and to keep existing ones. Mr. Rodi says he is willing to spend tens of millions if necessary to revive the company’s fortunes.

“Will we have success with it?” he said. “Yes, sir, we will have a success with it.”

…

After buying PBSC, Mr. Rodi made a major strategic shift, by getting the company out of the politically fraught business of actually operating bike-share systems. Instead, it would focus solely on selling hardware and software for others to run.

“We’re going back to our core business, which was to build this machine,” Mr. Rodi said. “I don’t need to worry about how many workers there are on this street or in that city. It’s not my job.”

[PotomacCyclist]

http://news.yahoo.com/motivated-ride-bike-bike-share-company-changes-name-040128457–finance.html

Alta Bicycle Share was bought out by Related Companies and Equinox. The company was moved to NYC. This isn’t news. But the new name is. The former Alta Bicycle Share will now be known as Motivate.

The local system will retain the name of Capital Bikeshare, unless something very strange happens. But it will now by managed by a company called Motivate.

[PotomacCyclist]

CityLab interviewed Jay Walder, CEO of Motivate (formerly known as Alta Bicycle Share).

http://www.citylab.com/commute/2015/01/a-conversation-jay-walder-the-man-running-motivate-the-nations-biggest-bike-share-company/384534/

He makes a couple interesting points that could be relevant for Capital Bikeshare. (Motivate operates Capital Bikeshare on behalf of the member jurisdictions: DC/Arlington/Alexandria/Montgomery County. However, the Capital Bikeshare site has not been updated. It still lists Alta Bicycle Share as the system operator.) He mentions technology, which is a much bigger problem for Citi Bike because they are using the newer, flawed software that Bixi created (not the superior 8D software used for CaBi). He says that the company is looking to integrate the systems that they operate. This could mean that a Capital Bikeshare member could use the CaBi key and membership to check out bikes in other Motivate bikeshare cities like NYC, Chicago, Seattle, Toronto, Boston, Columbus OH, Chattanooga TN, and the San Francisco Bay Area. Motivate also operates the bikeshare system in Melbourne, Australia.

He also mentions integration with other transit systems and the use of smartphones to accomplish that. 8D offers the free Spotcycle app, which displays bike/dock data in near-real time, but it does not allow visitors to sign up for short-term memberships. Perhaps a new Motivate and/or 8D app could accomplish these purposes. WMATA is planning to study the use of alternative methods of payment for MetroRail in the near future. This could include pay-by-phone service and station entrance. If so, could this be tied into the CaBi system somehow? This could be convenient for even annual members. They might be able to check out a bike by waving their smartphone near the reader, instead of using the bike key. The bike key readers could be available as an alternate method, but a smartphone system could make the checkout process much faster. This can remove logjams at popular stations where today, visitors have to go through a slow and tedious process of obtaining individual number codes. If there is a large group, this prevents other people from using the kiosk. (An annual member may need to use the kiosk to ask for the 15 minutes of extra time.)

Alta and 8D already have a partnership to create a new type of kiosk that would allow for key purchases at kiosks. They could also integrate some of these new features. At least the new CEO is looking into these possibilities. I think it would be great to be able to use a CaBi key in all of those other bikeshare cities.

[kwarkentien]

I like the idea of a universal key. I’ve considered getting a membership for CitiBike but I haven’t had enough annual visits to justify it. But using my CaBi key would be great. I hope this moves forward.

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