La Perle Rare has designed a platform to facilitate transportation for people with reduced mobility. With the Faciligo project, new technologies are paving the way for significant social progress on a territory-wide level in the Montpellier Métropole area.
Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole possesses large amounts of digital data that could be useful for a broader audience. To reach its goals, Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole launched a “Smart City” call-for-ideas, in early 2015, so that companies could come up with designs for new services based on that data.
Hind Emad took advantage of the opportunity: the young company director proposed to facilitate access to public transportation for people with reduced mobility by creating a new service, Faciligo. Her company, La Perle Rare, laureate of the selection process, benefits both from assistance by the Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole Business and Innovation Centre (BIC) and access to the data in question, namely real-time data regarding public transportation. Hind Emad explains: “Montpellier Métropole enriches the Faciligo platform with its data and has enabled us to create two jobs.”
Shortly after its selection, Faciligo also won the Big Data Challenge organized by the Montpellier and Rennes Métropoles. This enabled the company to obtain a grant from BPI, the French Public Investment Bank. Then to top it all off, the project convinced the jury of the regional SNCF Mobi Data LR challenge and the SNCF National Digital Challenge. Faciligo also participated in the first edition of the Access Solutions Forum organized by SNCF in December 2015 with, as a reward, a partnership with SNCF Développement. In turn, SNCF provides access to its data, notably regarding inter-regional trains, to further enrich the service.
By leveraging provided data, Faciligo helps bring people with reduced mobility (handicapped and elderly people, pregnant women, etc.) into contact with able-bodied people who are willing to accompany them on their trip, practically on a volunteer basis.
The application is based on a trip calculation engine that indicates where people are, along with the actual time required for trips on public transportation, and helps bring them together.
The system saves assisted people significant amounts of money. Faciligo highlights the altruistic nature of this relationship for able-bodied people, but Hind Emad says: “We can take the concept even further, with people who accompany others earning points for each trip. Based on some amount of points, they could benefit from a discount on their own transportation passes, or donate their earnings to charity.”
The service is expected to launch in February 2016 in the Montpellier Métropole area. You may already sign up on faciligo.fr.
Find out more:
- Faciligo- Smart City- Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole Business and Innovation Centre (BIC)
Hind Emad took advantage of the opportunity: the young company director proposed to facilitate access to public transportation for people with reduced mobility by creating a new service, Faciligo. Her company, La Perle Rare, laureate of the selection process, benefits both from assistance by the Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole Business and Innovation Centre (BIC) and access to the data in question, namely real-time data regarding public transportation. Hind Emad explains: “Montpellier Métropole enriches the Faciligo platform with its data and has enabled us to create two jobs.”
Shortly after its selection, Faciligo also won the Big Data Challenge organized by the Montpellier and Rennes Métropoles. This enabled the company to obtain a grant from BPI, the French Public Investment Bank. Then to top it all off, the project convinced the jury of the regional SNCF Mobi Data LR challenge and the SNCF National Digital Challenge. Faciligo also participated in the first edition of the Access Solutions Forum organized by SNCF in December 2015 with, as a reward, a partnership with SNCF Développement. In turn, SNCF provides access to its data, notably regarding inter-regional trains, to further enrich the service.
By leveraging provided data, Faciligo helps bring people with reduced mobility (handicapped and elderly people, pregnant women, etc.) into contact with able-bodied people who are willing to accompany them on their trip, practically on a volunteer basis.
The application is based on a trip calculation engine that indicates where people are, along with the actual time required for trips on public transportation, and helps bring them together.
The system saves assisted people significant amounts of money. Faciligo highlights the altruistic nature of this relationship for able-bodied people, but Hind Emad says: “We can take the concept even further, with people who accompany others earning points for each trip. Based on some amount of points, they could benefit from a discount on their own transportation passes, or donate their earnings to charity.”
The service is expected to launch in February 2016 in the Montpellier Métropole area. You may already sign up on faciligo.fr.
Find out more:
- Faciligo- Smart City- Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole Business and Innovation Centre (BIC)
