Smart Mobility Management 7 - Dossier Car Sharing

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Nexus Communication – Smart Mobility Management n°7 – Quarterly periodic magazine October 2012 – Deposit Office Liège X

International Integrated Corporate Mobility Solutions

I DOSSIER Car Sharing in Europe I Case Studies Euler Hermes

Arcadis Delhaize

I Strategy

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the sharing principle

I

n Europe, a new movement called the ‘sharing economy’ is embedded in the philosophy that sharing is as efficient as owning. The idea of using a vehicle only when needed and paying only when being driven is becoming increasingly attractive. This is particularly true in the P2P environment where the recent successes of car sharing initiatives across Europe, such as Autolib’, DB Flinkster, Greenwheels, Cambio or CityCarClub, are quite remarkable.

But what is happening in the B2B-segment? Suppliers are certainly willing and starting to propose interesting corporate mobility services. But the current offerings do not yet seem attractive enough to convince business clients to throw away ‘old habits’ and make a ‘strong move’ to corporate car sharing.

To make the change happen, more is needed from suppliers and customers than just change management. Corporate car sharing can only be successful if: 1. Corporate users feel a similar degree of comfort as when driving their company car. Technology performance in terms of information and payment systems will be decisive.

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2. Suppliers do not consider the expansion of alternative mobility modes as a threat to their classic core business activities, but consider car sharing as a unique new opportunity.

3. Users think beyond the nominal price element and corporate clients think beyond the pure cost cutting goal.

4. Governments propose real incentives favoring the wider integration of new smart mobility modes such as bike sharing, public transportation, car pooling and car sharing.

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With this issue of Smart Mobility Management we hope to stimulate the further development of B2B car sharing and invite you to keep abreast of the latest car sharing and mobility news on www.smart-mobilitymanagement.com.

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smart mobility management - n°7 I 3

Travelling together more often saves more.

The mobility of your business drivers is often a major cost item. And on top of that, there is all the time wasted queuing in traffic. A smarter implementation of your mobility policy can be of particular advantage in situations like this where you are looking for tangible cost-cutting measures. For example, you will see immediate economic benefits if your employees share a vehicle for journeys slightly more often. But it might be even more cost-efficient to let them work together occasionally at a flexible workspace close to home. Here at Athlon Mobility Consultancy, our approach is to take a critical look at your entire mobility policy. Based on that, we advise you on a sustainable, cost-saving and practical comprehensive solution. Interested to see how objective advice can help your organisation get ahead? Then go to www.athlonmobilityconsultancy.com.

Athlon Mobility Consultancy, Re-think your connection

Athlon Mobility Consultancy is part of De Lage Landen International B.V.

Content 6

DOSSIER

24

European Car Sharing Boom Continues

12 Offer Only with enough time, money and resources

18 Technology Will car sharing make us go electric?

19 Taxation

case studies

industry

22 European Commission

30 Arcadis

37 Two-wheeled mobility

SUMP or Sustainable Urban Mobilty Plans

24 Mobility Management

The latest news on the world of car sharing

he exercise of T measuring value

26 Mobility Management

Mobility theory put to practice

The Segway is taking Lille city by storm

32 Delhaize Three-pronged mobility attack

38 Rail Productive Mobility The train takes you there

34 Euler Hermes Root and branch change

40 Air travel Not just green, but greener

From a travel programme to mobility management

Taxes are no car sharing stimulator

20 News

40

strategy

CARE SHARING 6 Market

30

42 Air travel Making air travel greener while keeping it safe

28 B50 Platform Working and travelling smart in the Netherlands

29 News The discover the latest market and industry news

ISSUE N째8 SMART MOBILITY MANAGEMENT: The development of Telematics and other new mobility supports

Caroline Thonnon Content & Business Development (cthonnon@nexuscommunication.be)

Thao Vandepoel INTERNAL SUPPORT (tvandepoel@nexuscommunication.be)

Steven Schoefs Chief Editor (sschoefs@nexuscommunication.be)

Filip Van Mullem Marketing & Development (fvanmullem@nexuscommunication.be)

David Baudeweyns Sales & Business Development (dbaudeweyns@nexuscommunication.be) Romina De Gregorio Internal Sales (rdegregorio@nexuscommunication.be)

Contributers: Tim Harrup, Frank Jacobs, Dirk Steyvers, Philippe Martin, Jonathan Green (3SIXTY), Bart Vanham, Martyn Briggs (Frost & Sullivan)

Kathleen Hubert Operations & Communication (khubert@nexuscommunication.be)

MANAGING PARTNER: Thierry Degives

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smart mobility management - n째7 I 5

DOSSIER

Car Sharing

European Car Sharing Boom Continues The European market for Car Sharing services continues to grow at an unprecedented rate; between 2008 and 2011 saw almost a 60 per cent increase in subscribers from 500,000 to more than 800,000 members of either a “Traditional” or “Peer to Peer (P2P)” Car Sharing service.

According to Frost & Sullivan analysis, this trend is set to continue, with a forecast 15 million traditional Car Sharing members and another 750,000 P2P Car Sharing members by 2020, representing a 40% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) for traditional and 20% CAGR for P2P Car Sharing. This is a trend that hasn’t gone unnoticed by vehicle manufacturers (OEMs) and indeed several other organisations, and is leading to convergence of the market and business models, posing several opportunities and challenges to businesses ahead.

Mega Trends Influencing the Market for Car Sharing Whilst Car Sharing as a concept has existed in the market for many years, there are several mega trends that are combining to change the market dynamics, and foster such a vast growth environment, as represented in figure 1.

Continued urbanisation and creation of Mega Cities provides the necessary population density for Car Sharing to become sustainable. More recent advances in technology that allow users to locate, book, and access the vehicles, increasingly on smart phones, is one of the key facilitators of recent Car Sharing growth.

smart mobility management - n°7 I 6

Of course, government policy and legislation has also played a key role in the development of Car Sharing as a concept, in the provision of subsidised/free on street parking in some London Boroughs, or direct subsidies in countries like France. Also, continued investment

and promotion of sustainable and integrated/multi modal transport fits well with the Car Sharing business model, firstly because each Car Sharing vehicle results in on average 12-14 private vehicles being removed from the congested roads (Source: Frost & Sullivan analysis),

fig.1: Mega Trends impacting the growth of Car Sharing in Europe

URBANISATION & MEGA CITIES INCREASED COST OF VEHICLE OWNERSHIP

INTEGRATED MOBILITY

TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENTS

GOVERNMENT POLICY & INCENTIVES

SOCIAL PREFERENCES “VALUE FOR MANY”

Source: Frost and Sullivan analysis.

fig.2: Expanding Car Sharing Business Models

Car Sharing Traditional

For-Profit

Personal

Corporate

Non-Profit

EV

P2P

Co-operative

Non-EV

and secondly because Car Sharing as an economical option can act as a source of first and last mile connectivity in areas where setting up of expensive public transport infrastructure is not feasible.

The cost of owning a private vehicle has increased significantly in recent years; for example in the UK, all motoring costs doubled between 1997 and 2010, outstripping inflation considerably – the retail prices index increase over the same period was 40%. Coupled with challenging economic conditions in Europe, this is undoubtedly making people consider whether vehicle ownership is necessary, particularly in the face of improving alternatives such as Car Sharing.

Collaborative consumption Another interesting trend that is influencing the demand for Car Sharing is that of collaborative consumption, also referred to as “value for many”, or “the shared economy”, where generally there is a trend towards maximising assets, from shopping services like Groupon, accommodation services like AirBnB, or specifically in transportation the temporary rental of vehicles or parking spaces. All of which involve the sweating of assets and pooling of consumers to create new business models.

However, what we find most interesting in much of the ongoing mega trends research that we’re undertaking, is the changing social preferences in relation to mobility. There is an argument that younger drivers no longer consider owning a car a necessity in terms of status, individualism and freedom.

Some people attribute this back to the cost of ownership issue, but others realise that the connected era and changing social interaction, via social media and online gaming for example, in many cases replaces the need to travel at all. One challenge related to this, which is equally a challenge for Car Sharing organisations also, is the changing rate of driving license uptake altogether in these younger drivers; the rate of 17-20 year olds obtaining full driving licenses in the UK decreased from 41% in 2000 to 35% by 2010, and more alarmingly from 75% to 63% of 21-29 year olds over the same period.

One-way

For-Profit

Non-Profit

Round-Trip

The most prominent of these factors affecting the growth of Car Sharing services specifically is up for debate, but these changing preferences amongst younger drivers that are leading to a new age of mobility services. The more that people begin to almost consider cars as “white goods”, expecting mobility on demand irrespective of brand, and become disenchanted with the traditional view of the car as a reflection of status, could be the main catalyst for such forecast rapid growth of Car Sharing in Europe.

Emerging Business Models and Convergence Although many consider Car Sharing as a commercial concept to still be in its relative infancy, these changing and in some cases conflicting trends have led to a number of alternative business models and convergence with other parts of the automotive industry. Figure 2 shows the current breadth of the Car Sharing business models.

What started with “traditional personal Car Sharing operators”, or a situation where a third party rents out their vehicles to a group of paying members (and covering insurance and fuel costs), has rapidly diverged to also include traditional corporate Car Sharing and an entirely new paradigm of P2P Car Sharing. Traditional corporate Car Sharing is seen by many operators as a lucrative opportunity to reduce costs to businesses whilst providing high quality vehicles to employees, and can be used as part of a “mobility budget” or “mobility allowances”; an increasing trend whereby employees can rent a series of vehicles at differing rates to an agreed monthly/ term limit. The benefits to the employer are the reduced costs enjoyed by pooling vehicles (rather than providing a vehicle for each employee); the employee can enjoy a higher standard of vehicle and often a number of models to choose from, and the vehicle provider reduces their financial risk by in most cases receiving a set leasing value per vehicle irrespective of the vehicles utilisation, and receives a higher value for the vehicle to pay for the pre installed Car Sharing technology.

Whilst traditional corporate Car Sharing currently accounts for 25% of total traditional Car Sharing members, Frost & Sullivan

smart mobility management - n°7 I 7

DOSSIER

Car Sharing

fig.3: Convergence with other market segments

BMW Daimler VW Renault

Point of convergence

ALD LeasePlan ING Lease Arval

VEHICLE MANUFACTURERS (OEMs)

LEASING COMPANIES

DEDICATED CSOs

Mobility Greenwheels Stadtmobil Cambio Autolb Zipcar Avencar

TRANSPORT OPERATORS

Cologne public Transport Helsinki public Transport Swiss National Railway Amsterdam City PT Brussels STIB

forecasts that this is expected to grow to 37% of total traditional Car Sharing members by 2020.

Secondly, the emergence of P2P Car Sharing services has further diversified the Car Sharing concept, with P2P operators finding customers willing to rent vehicles, and leveraging the same location/access technologies and insurance services as traditional Car Sharing operators, but using privately owned vehicles. In this case, anyone that owns a car can advertise their vehicle for rent as part of the P2P service, with the revenues from rentals split between the vehicle owners and P2P operators. This has a separate element of challenges to the mass adoption, with the main being acceptance of the owners to third parties using their vehicles. However, the growth of this concept has been considerable, with a fourfold increase in

smart mobility management - n°7 I 8

Source: Frost and Sullivan analysis.

members from 2010-2011, and a forecast 21% CAGR in members (from 130k to 750k) between 2011-2020 (Source: Frost & Sullivan analysis), with particular adoption in France.

The aforementioned mega trends and growth rates in the Car Sharing industry have not gone unnoticed by other segments of the automotive industry. As figure 3 shows, in fact, already there are a number of points of convergence in the Car Sharing industry, in particular between the Car Sharing organisations themselves and vehicle manufacturers (OEMs), leasing companies, and transportation providers. This provides a unique level of convergence, and allows many operators to potentially be considered as “mobility integrators� by leveraging both private and public transportation as a complementary offering, rather than competing. What I

also find particularly interesting are the competing interests within this converging landscape.

OEMs and lessors The OEMs reportedly see Car Sharing as an opportunity to penetrate new markets and brand loyalty, especially amongst younger drivers. Traditionally younger drivers would start their driving days with older and lower quality vehicles, set against very high insurance premiums. Premium manufacturers like Daimler (through Car2Go) and BMW (through DriveNow) understand that providing younger drivers with their entry level models could in fact lock in brand loyalty from a young age, so that when these drivers are in the position to buy a vehicle outright, there is a higher chance that it will be with the brand/ vehicle they use for Car Sharing.

Similarly, on the corporate side, premium manufacturers enjoy a higher level of customer retention (83% compared to 75% in a recent Frost & Sullivan survey), and sales of optional extras, in their corporate leasing markets compared to private outright purchase markets. All of these conditions is leading to more OEMs and leasing companies entering the car sharing (traditional and corporate) market.

Transport operators Lastly are the transport operators/ authorities themselves. An interesting trend, particularly in France and Germany (with Veolia and Deutsche Bahn respectively), has been the emergence of Car Sharing schemes integrated as part of a cities multi modal transport offering. This is undoubtedly the future (in my opinion) of a sustainable urban transport network, with companies offering both private and personal mobility that gives the consumer a choice depending on their preferences, but most importantly, integrated as part of a structured fare system that can be benchmarked against other city zonal fare schemes.

As well as cross industry convergence, there is also a number of partnerships and M&A activity changing the Car Sharing industry. In particular, Zipcar’s continued European expansion (integrating Austria’s Denzeldrive, Spain’s Avancar, and the UK’s Streetcar in the last 3 years) has allowed an increased market share and reach. Similarly, OEM partnerships, such as Daimler’s Car2Go with Europcar, and BMW with Sixt, have allowed instant access to the market; indeed Car2Go, DriveNow and VW’s Quicar account for over 30% of members in Germany despite relatively recent incorporation of DriveNow and Quicar.

In future, it is anticipated that continued growth and short term returns in the case of P2P Car Sharing, will attract further players/industry segments to the market, in particular private equity and investment funds; good early examples of this are easyCar and Buy2letcars in the UK. European Market Comparisons Currently, the largest markets for car sharing services in Europe are the UK, Germany, and Switzerland, with almost 77% of the 2011 members. By 2020, the market will be dominated by the UK, Germany, and France, although with a lower 60% of the total European market. Figure 4 identifies the key market sizes and growth trends to 2020. fig.4: Current European Car Sharing Volumes

& Growth Forecasts 80% 70% Spain

60%

France

50% Germany

Italy

40%

Sweden Netherlands 30% Belgium Austria 20%

UK

Switzerland

many of the “generation X” and older drivers still consider car ownership to be a right, with no willingness to share, especially amongst more affluent cities. A separate issue is the population density within cities; any car sharing service is dependent on a vehicle’s utilisation rate to define profitability, and a more concentrated location and higher rates of members is required to make the solution viable, potentially excluding most rural areas from such services.

In addition, government support, either through direct grants/ subsidies, or indirect policy leverage such as free parking or waiving of city fees (congestion charging, electric vehicle charging, etc) can influence the margins of viability within a Car Sharing scheme, and if removed or altered could see reduced offering. It is however noted how most city governments appreciate the benefits of Car Sharing, and have independent organisations such as Carplus in the UK, or the pan European Momo initiative continue to highlight this and lobby for additional policy intervention in relation to Car Sharing.

10% 0% 0

1.000

2.000

3.000

4.000

5.000

6.000

7.000

8.000

VEHICLES 2011

Source: Frost and Sullivan analysis.

Future Outlook, Limitations, and Conclusions Whilst it is clear the growth opportunities for Car Sharing services in Europe are unprecedented and attracting numerous investments, there are a number of challenges to be considered that could preclude such forecast growth in the industry.

In the short term at least, this could be a generational aspect;

To conclude, Frost & Sullivan’s recent research study highlights a significant growth opportunity for Car Sharing services in Europe, influenced by considerable mega trends and market/ economic headwinds, facilitated by changing technology and consumer preferences. This will see a growth from 0.7 million to 15 million members in Europe from 2011-20, and from 0.02 million to 0.2 million vehicles over the same period (both traditional).

smart mobility management - n°7 I 9

DOSSIER

Car Sharing

Converging market trends, expanding business models and “the shared economy� result in growing Car Sharing UK In the UK, Zipcar are the clear market leader with nearly 45-50% of total traditional Car Sharing members. At present, London is the single core market for Car Sharing, with more than 83% of members being based there. Whilst this demonstrates the current appeal of Car Sharing in London, there is significant growth forecast in other major cities like Birmingham, Bristol, and Manchester. With over 210,000 Car Sharing members, the UK represents 30% of the total European Car Sharing market in 2011. Whilst this is set to grow to nearly 2.4 million members by 2020, the proportion to the total European market will reduce to 16 per cent as other countries start Car Sharing adoption.

GERMANY In Germany, there are over 130 Car Sharing operators at present, although the major providers include BMW, Daimler, VW, DB Flinkster, and Cambio. Nearly 33 per cent of the European market (members), Germany is the largest car sharing market with 240,000 members, set to increase to 3.4 million by 2020.

France Whilst France has just 50,000 members in 2011, significant growth led by new operators and increased government incentives/subsidies will see the market grow to a forecast 2.9 million members by 2020, with investment from large scale operators like Avis, Hertz and Autolib influencing demand but particular growth estimated in P2P schemes such as Buzzcar, Voiturelib and alike.

REST OF EUROPE With continued growth in other countries like Italy, Austria, Belgium, Holland and Spain, the CAGR for traditional and corporate Car Sharing membership to 2020 is forecast to be 40%, and 21% for P2P Car Sharing services over the same period.

About the author Martyn Briggs is the Programme Manager for Mobility Research, in the Automotive and Transportation practice at Frost & Sullivan, a Global Research and Consulting company. Martyn is currently managing strategic mobility assignments, helping clients to identify growth potential through leveraging technology and new business models.

Contact Martyn.Briggs@frost.com or linked in

smart mobility management - n°7 I 10

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DOSSIER

Car Sharing

Only with enough time, money and resources As mobility management has morphed from theoretical concept to accepted reality across the fleet industry, it has created some interesting side-effects. One of which is the blurring between the industry’s supply segments.

And nowhere more so than in the relatively new business of car sharing.

T

here used to be a time when a manufacturer (OEM) would sell a car to a leasing company; that leasing company would then lease that car to a rental company; and this rental company would then, finally, rent the car to the actual end user - someone who used the car for a relatively short term. But today, each of these supply segments is talking directly to the end user - as well as carrying on their original business. The picture is complicated further by the emergence of new companies specialising in the relatively new business of car sharing.

What are the visions and strategies of the companies dealing with this brave new world? That depends on who you talk to: the lease and rent companies, the manufacturers, and the specialists.

Cities are asking the million-dollar question: How do we keep everybody moving?

smart mobility management - n°7 I 12

1. Lease and rental companies Looking at mobility comprehensively, Alphabet finds its business is no longer just about leasing cars or managing fleets - it’s about providing the corporate sector with mobility solutions that are both economically and ecologically sound like corporate car sharing.

AlphaCity, a solution that’s both innovative and flexible, is therefore seen as crucial to Alphabet’s identity as a business mobility provider. The company keeps building new mobility solutions, aiming to be the market trendsetter. As the company itself likes to repeat, integrating different modes of transport via innovative mobility solutions is ‘self-evident at Alphabet’.

For ALD Automotive, it’s the shifting marketplace itself that requires a re-statement of emphasis: “We aim to add to our product range the innovative solutions that may become the core business in a few years’ time, while building a different relationship with our corporate clients”. On the supplier side, ALD prefers companies (‘pure’ car-sharers and others) with state-of-the-art technology so it can minimise time to market and maximise the product’s offering. As for customers, ALD Automotive places great emphasis on the number of registered users, and even more so on the cars’ rotation rate.

Considering the low volumes at present (not to mention the large upfront investment), ALD clearly is in it for the long haul.

Optimisation & Simplicity Athlon Car Lease has a shocking statistic: 90% of business cars in its Dutch home market spend their time in office parking lots instead of on the road. That is a lot of untapped potential, and a great opportunity to increase the efficiency of the corporate fleet. Car sharing is the solution to the problem, providing added value also in corporate mobility’s social and environmental dimensions. Everybody wins: the employer, the employee, and the environment. The bigger picture, according to Athlon, is that car use is gaining importance over car ownership. Responding to and reinforcing the trend, Athlon matches vehicle overcapacity with the demand for cheaper, more flexible rental solutions. The business model includes a one-off fee for a license that provides access to a car sharing platform (white-label, so it can be customised to any brand), as well as a commission for any car share transactioned through the platform. “Setting up a full-blown, professional and highly scalable car sharing platform, and managing it, require vast reserves of time, money and other resources”, Athlon Car Lease warns. “We expect our car sharing venture to become profitable in 2013, when it has reached a certain scale.”

As one of the world’s largest and best-known short term rental companies in the world, Hertz’s business has always been close to ‘car sharing’ anyway. Hertz On Demand, its global car sharing club, consists of over 800 vehicles, 180.000 members and 500 locations worldwide - including universities and corporate offices. Such a big network is managed best by keeping it as simple as possible - from application through reservation to actual driving and returning. But is the approach also profitable?

Hertz provides this cryptic answer: “Profitability is a large concept, and there will be some business segments that are more profitable than others.”

smart mobility management - n°7 I 13

DOSSIER

Car Sharing

In recent years, there’s been a remarkable change in vehicle usage across Europe

2. Car manufacturers With its car2go service operating in North America and Europe, Daimler is one of the manufacturers most active in car sharing.

The company confirms that car sharing and bike-sharing have risen remarkably in the world’s cities. With car2go, Daimler aims to refine these concepts, making individual mobility easier and more flexible.

New business opportunities The idea for car2go came from Daimler’s Business Innovation Department, a unit hunting for future business opportunities. It concluded that as urban agglomerations will continue to grow in population and traffic density, the million-dollar questions are: How do we keep everybody moving? What about sustainability?

And how to save space for urban quality of life? Car2go could become the large-scale, profitable answer to those questions, as the preliminary results seem to confirm Daimler’s projections.

But again, success - or more precisely, future success - does not come cheap: “Car2go needs upfront investments to develop business and validate concepts. But because Daimler sees huge potential in car2go, which it sees leading the race towards sustainable mobility, it remains strongly committed to the investment.”

Peugeot too has studied the changing market closely, and it sees opportunities developing over the next 5 years for carpools: “There is real demand from our customers, and the formula is consistent with our brand and strategy.” This autumn, Peugeot will conduct internal trials for different parts of its programme, including a mobility audit for all its sites, self-

smart mobility management - n°7 I 14

Setting up a professional and highly scalable car sharing platform, and managing it, require vast reserves of time, money and other resources.

service 2-wheel mobility and an electric vehicle pool, along with a sharing programme for existing company cars. The trials are meant to identify opportunities for cost reduction and fleet down-sizing, to observe staff reactions in order to provide accurate services and improve well-being, among other goals.

“We’ll test our solutions on ourselves before we try them out on our customers. While the experiments cost money, we still expect the systems to be profitable within 3 years.”

Behavioural changes Volkswagen has been keeping a close eye on new mobility concepts for some time, and has distilled its observations into its own car sharing scheme, Quicar. VW has noticed important changes in vehicle usage, especially with the younger, more urban crowd. Some people don’t want their own car in the city - others simply can’t afford one. But neither group wants to give up its individual mobility. This is exactly the kind of market Quicar is designed to tap - and to study: Volkswagen has been surprised to learn that not just young people and students use Quicar, but also pensioners. But Quicar’s business model is not just to attract new target groups, eventually it intends to operate as a self-standing profitable business.

Eco-friendly Renault operates a scheme built around its two-seater, all-electric city car, the Twizy. The manufacturer is preparing a full-scale test of ‘Twizy Way by Renault’ , its innovative sustainable mobility service accessible to all. The service is intended to reinforce Renault’s status as an innovative, eco-friendly manufacturer, and more to the point, that Twizy is a particularly well-suited tool for car sharing…

Is Car Sharing an interesting mobility solution for corporates?

Results of the Smart Mobility Management Poll – August 2012

3. The specialists What about the specialists, those companies that are all about car sharing?

Taxistop has been ‘promoting and facilitating collaborative consumption since 1975’, and was the force driving the professionalisation of car sharing, launching schemes in Brussels, Liège, Namur, Ghent, Antwerp and other cities.

Taxistop does more than offer professional car sharing. It also takes part in a private initiative, Autopia. Its mission is to help private individuals develop their own peer-to-peer car-shares, offering insurance and web support, among other things. There are no fixed fees or agreements. All depends on the car’s owner and those who want to use it. Autopia merely helps negotiate the initial agreements, in line with each group’s specific needs.

With highly visible stations in Brussels, Cambio is another carshare company. It operates on a per-kilometre and per-hour basis, with insurance and fuel included. The service is available 24/7, and no direct is needed to pick up a car. The service now also operates in Ireland and Germany. While Cambio is a forprofit (and even profitable) company, both Taxistop and Autopia are not-for-profit organisations, with Autopia receiving subsidies for its services.

Spirit of collaboration Meanwhile in Switzerland, Mobility International claims that its success is founded on its spirit of collaboration - by and for the collective: “It was set up as a cooperative, serving the transport needs of individuals while preserving the environment of the wider collective”. Mobility International is owned and supervised by its 46,000 members, and has a total of 102,000 customers, and is still expanding its clientele. The long-term success of the company is linked to the economic, social and ecological value its adds to the community.

The cooperative business model allows for sustainable growth, as revenue has to be reinvested into the business itself.

Member shares and private loans form the basis for Mobility International’s continued growth, which gets by without external investments.

Tim Harrup

No, car sharing is to complex to organize

No, car sharing is not cost-efficient enough 12%

Yes, my company is thinking about installing a car sharing scheme

6%

31% 50%

Yes, my company is already using car sharing

In their own words from LinkedIn Bernard Dehaye (Belfius) “Belfius Bank has been using Cambio cars as pool cars since 2010. We installed car sharing stations with 9 vehicles at our buildings in Brussels. We halved our fleet of owned service vehicles from 40 to 20. The big advantage is that when we do not use car sharing vehicles, off-peak, for example, they cost us nothing...It is excellent for the company image, as it reduces the influence on parking.”

Jon West (HRS Hotel Reservation Service) “I think it’s a great idea. However London is just not set up with office parking and NCP or local parking is so expensive for full day parking, the car share would need to be full each day to make it worthwhile.”

Manish Garg (Frost & Sullivan) “Yes, corporate car sharing is an interesting mobility solution. It avoids an employee from using his/her vehicle for company related works….it helps the company to cut down on the cost incurred in hiring a cab. The company car also helps the employees to use the same vehicle, at a cost, after office hours and also over weekends. This cost helps the company to repay any such cost to the leasing company.”

Emmanuelle Katz (Carbox) “Yes, at Carbox we are keen to use our own car sharing system for the needs of our 15 employees. Cars are mainly used for professional purposes but all of us also enjoy the possibility to get a car for personal uses when it is needed…. good for employees’ motivation and costless compared to a traditional corporate fleet.”

Ireneusz Tyminski (Aon) “Interesting subject, but I have a few questions. How about cost efficiency? Some use terms like ‘costless’ but to what do you compare? Is it cheaper (…) than a taxi or a regular rent a car?...And do you only use it for occasional trips, as I cannot imagine that the benefit cars for key employees are replaced by a ‘shared one’.”

smart mobility management - n°7 I 15

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The E 300 BlueTEC HYBRID.

A Daimler Brand

At 4.2 litres of diesel per 100 kilometres, the new hybrid offensive from Mercedes-Benz – the E 300 BlueTEC HYBRID – is setting the benchmark when it comes to fuel consumption in the luxury business class vehicle segment. The modular hybrid concept with lithium-ion battery sets new record values in terms of efficiency with economical and comfort-enhancing innovations like the ECO start/stop function. Furthermore, it wins people over with its impressive driving experience and exemplary fuel consumption figures. The new efficiency record holder is also available as an estate. Find out more at www.mercedes-benz.com/fleet

*Fuel consumption urban/extra-urban/combined: 4.3–4.2/4.3–4.2/4.3–4.2 l/100 km, combined CO emissions: 112–109 g/km.

Figures do not relate to the specific emissions or fuel consumption of any individual vehicle, do not form part of any offer and are intended solely to aid comparison between different types of vehicle.

DOSSIER

Car Sharing Renault sees urban mobility as key to the future of EVs like its own Twizy.

Will car sharing make us go electric?

Who can blame fleet managers from doubting the potential of electric vehicles? But their short range and high TCO are less of a problem in a formula that may help popularise EVs: car sharing.

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lot of major players seem to think so, at least. In one form or another, they are experimenting with schemes that turn EVs’ perceived weaknesses on its head.

True, with a range limited to 150 km and a recharge lasting several hours, EVs are not the ideal tool for an active company fleet. But then there’s car sharing, a formula with generally much shorter trips.

‘Soft benefits’ For ALD Automotive, integrating EVs makes economic sense: “In the corporate environment, EVs are generally considered to have two major weaknesses - a range that is too short, and a Total Cost of Ownership that is too high. But car sharing, which uses vehicles for relatively short journeys before returning them to a designated parking area with a charging station, overcomes the range issue. And a high rotation at least alleviates the higher upfront cost.”

But there are also ‘soft benefits’ to using EVs: “We educate people in a new technology, and project a positive image, both inside and outside the company.”

Alphabet is also juggling EVs’ ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ benefits, aiming to reconcile economic benefits with a (more) positive image for the technology: “We consider EVs to be the ideal solution for urban mobility needs, and we will integrate them into our AlphaCity scheme - at some point…” Urban mobility indeed is key to the future of EVs, as is recognised by manufacturers such as Renault, which promotes its electric Twizy as “a vehicle particularly suited to the new urban mobility, with easy handling and minimum dimensions.”

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Intermodal transport For few are bold enough to think that electric vehicles are the future of mobility.

Rather, EVs are but one of many technologies that will enable mobility in the future. The trick is finding out what electric mobility’s part will be in that future.

Taxistop is trying to find out, among other ways via its Olympus project: this will see the introduction of 8 EVs in 3 or 4 Belgian cities, where Taxistop runs its Cambio car sharing service. “The idea is to get a clear perspective on the potential of EVs within the car sharing concept and as part of an intermodal transport chain, in combination with public transport.” The experiment seeks answers to some very practical questions, especially regarding battery management, reservation management, and how to train car-sharers in using EVs. And Taxistop is confident that those answers will be positive: “At the end of the project, we want to introduce more EVs into our car sharing fleet, maybe up to one in five cars. This will reduce CO2 emissions, and enable more offers combining public transport and EV-sharing.”

Convenient and simple Some might consider that a policy led by devout wishes rather than by cold, hard facts. Not in the least the Swiss operator Mobility International, which has a 25-year track record and 22 EVs in its fleet. “We brought in EVs not because we think that car sharing schemes are an ideal platform to test new technologies. As the provider of car sharing formulas, we believe that the choice of vehicles should follow from the principle that they must be as convenient and simple as possible.

On top of that, we are also committed to using low-emission vehicles. But the lack of an appropriate infrastructure - quick

and plentiful charging points - prevents us from introducing EVs on a large scale.”

Volkswagen, on the other hand, does believe car sharing is an ideal platform to introduce new technologies - and puts this belief into practice with its own car sharing scheme, Quicar. “Electric versions of the Golf, and our new small EV called up! will be launched in 2013. We think they will be very suitable for our car sharing fleet. So. as soon as we will offer these as standard models, we’ll integrate them step by step into Quicar.” For Hertz, it’s not just EVs, but car sharing itself that is a ‘new technology’: “In some countries, car sharing is still an ‘emerging market’; this fact will certainly help us introduce new car categories.” The people at Peugeot agree: “Car sharing certainly provides good leverage to sell more EVs, but also to introduce new technology, based on on-board telematics and electronic devices.”

Longer term So what’s the long-term prognosis for electric mobility, and indeed for car sharing itself? At Athlon Mobility Consultancy, they’re convinced their car sharing business platform is future-proof - both in terms of meeting future requirements of customers and introducing vehicles with new technology. As a sign of times to come, the platform will be completely EV-compatible. Whatever their take on electric mobility, the major players seem to agree that car sharing will play a substantial part in bringing the technology to a wider fleet audience. Even though it’s well known that the vast majority of car journeys is shorter than 40 km, it may take a scheme like car sharing to convince most drivers that the so-called ‘limited range’ of EVs is not a problem!

Tim Harrup

Taxes are no car sharing stimulator The challenging economic environment, an increased need for flexible mobility solutions and the decrease of the car as ‘status symbol’ are no doubt positive influences for the increasing popularity of car sharing.

Private initiatives have shown their success, and the pooling of company cars is on the up.

The existing taxation schemes are not capable yet of neutrally taxing the use of multiple means of mobility nor stimulating employees or employers to move into new mobility systems.

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axes do influence consumer behaviour, as witnessed by the success of CO2-friendly cars due to tax incentives. However, when it comes to car sharing or pool cars, taxes are still complex, not transparent and hence no stimulator for car sharing initiatives.

Car sharing of the ‘private car’ When participating in a car sharing program to book, pay and use cars for private purposes, no tax deductions are involved.

When we use the privately paid, shared car for commuting, a lump sum deduction, e.g. 0.15 Euros in Belgium, is usually allowed from personal taxable income, in most cases when not opting for a forfeit as a tax deductible cost.

When using the car for professional purposes, e.g. to visit clients, the actual cost is (partly) tax deductible. Proving and administering this is facilitated by the car sharing bills or invoices received.

Needless to say that in practice, car sharing will be most popular with those people who do not use the car on a regular basis.

Therefore, the above tax deductions may not be more beneficial than the forfeit tax deduction systems most countries have in place.

Car sharing of the ‘company car’ Clearly, car sharing is still in its early days but becoming increasingly an agenda item for many fleet managers. Pool cars are taxed as any other company car. The private use of a pool

car will give rise to a benefit in kind, unless it is very occasional private use (e.g. 500 kilometers in The Netherlands, exceptional use in Belgium). Since most countries apply a percentage of the purchase price as the basis for the benefit in kind regardless of the kilometers driven with the car, using a pool car for (some) private purposes does not seem favourable compared to a ‘normal’ individual company car. Using the pool car only for professional purposes, which in most countries does not include commuter traffic between home and office, will not result in a benefit in kind. But the proving this might be burdensome.

Taxes will in general not be a stimulator for employees who have company cars to change to a shared pool car system. Certainly when the pool car is combined with other mobility means where the taxation of the private use of these other mobility means may result in additional benefit in kind taxes.

Lessons to learn are that existing taxation regulations are not capable (yet) of neutrally taxing the use of multiple means of mobility for private purposes nor stimulating employees or employers to move into these systems. When other motivators suffice to implement such a car pooling/sharing system, it is advisable to understand the current boundaries of the current tax regulations in order to prevent unpleasant surprises in any tax bills. Hopefully to be continued with adapted regulations.

Bart Vanham Car Taxation Expert

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DOSSIER

Car Sharing

Multi-mobility in Hamburg

Car2go comes to Miami

In Hamburg, Europcar, the car sharing scheme car2go, and the local rail/metro company Hamburg Hochbahn will undertake a 24-month trial of a new multimodal mobility concept. The goal is to link comprehensively the transport offerings of the three providers, and appeal to both private and corporate users. In the concept, selected local rail stops will serve as a mobility service point, enabling passengers to switch between train, metro, bus, rental car, car-share, and even bikes. The slogan for the concept will be: “The right offer at the right moment in the right place, all in the same place.”

The car sharing scheme car2go has arrived in Miami. As in other cities, the scheme features smartfortwo cars, 240 of which will be available for public use in Florida’s largest city.

One of the features of car2go is that cars can be used for as long or short a time as necessary, and that cars can be left at any legal parking spot. Use is charged by the minute. Art Noriega, CEO of the Miami parking Authority, commented: “Car2go will provide our customers with the flexibility to use another form of transport on an as-needed basis, thus expanding personal mobility options”. Cars can be located by smartphone, booked by phone or simply ‘found’ in the street.

Miami pushing personal mobility with car2go scheme.

Mobility suppliers building an innovative multi-modal mobility concept.

D’Ieteren launches ‘Keyzee’ car-pooling system D’Ieteren’s new mobility initiative Keyzee is centred on the concept of ‘collaborative consumption’: cars will be used by more than one person, one family, or one group of employees. This implies obvious logistical challenges, that Keyzee resolves via smartphones. Booking, unlocking and starting the car can all be done over the phone. Potential users who opt for Keyzee as their car-pool management system can have the entire virtual kit installed in 15 minutes. Keyzee is one example of a shift in fleet management from TCO (Total Cost of Ownership) to TCM (Total Cost of Mobility).

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Daimler takes stake in carpooling.com Car- and ride-sharing pioneers Daimler and carpooling.com are joining forces to develop and expand carpooling.com’s Europewide service. Daimler takes a minority stake in its partner, leaving the bulk of company in the hands of its founders and venture capitalists Earlybird. Carpooling.com currently has 4 million registered users in Europe, with 1 million using the system to get rides. Daimler’s involvement will enable both companies to integrate their mobility solutions. Daimler, which is behind car2go, this year also invested in MyTaxi and trialled a system called car2gether in two German cities.

Keyzee, a virtual key on your smart phone is also a tool to help manage the fleet.

For Daimler, ridesharing is intelligent networked mobility.

Car sharing for car makers?

Zipcar acquires CarSharing.at in Austria By acquiring Denzel Mobility CarSharing, Austria’s leading car sharing service operating under the name CarSharing.at, Zipcar continues expanding its global car sharing network deeper into Europe. Last February, it acquired Catalunya Carsharing SA (operating as Avancar). More recently, it integrated Streetcar’s UK operations into Zipcar. Says recently appointed president of Zipcar Europe, Frerk-Male Feller: “Our technology, expertise and network can help scale CarSharing.at in Austria, and thus help our plan to grow into a leading car sharing network across Europe.”

Urban car sharing fully in line with electric vehicle development.

Every car shared means 10 to 14 cars are taken off the road.

The US Department of Energy recorded a drop in car ownership by 4 million in 2009, the first significant decline since records began in 1960. “We hope that if you know you have access to a car, you will round down the number of cars you own”, says Shelby Clark, founder of RelayRides, the most extensive peerto-peer car sharing network in the US. That may seem at odds with what car manufacturers want, but General Motors is teaming up with RelayRides to allow GM drivers to rent out their cars via the network. GM is not alone: Daimler, Ford, BMW, Toyota and Renault all have or are developing their own relationships with car sharing services.

DriveNow partners Berlin public transport company DriveNow partners Berlin public transport company Berlin public transport company BVG has partnered with car sharing scheme DriveNow (a BMW subsidiary) to offer car sharing to Berlin residents with subscriptions to BVG, thus providing a further alternative to the use of private cars in the city. The free subscription was made available to all of the 250,000 registered BVG users, with the first 500 receiving 90 free car sharing minutes and the remainder 60 minutes. The system is easy to use by smartphone app or from a home computer, and BVG Director Henrik Falk refers to ‘one-stop shopping’ for various types of mobility.

Zipcar has global appetite.

Karlsruhe tops German car sharing list The German car-sharing association ‘Bundesverband CarSharing’ (BCS) has taken the opportunity of the European Mobility Week to release the list of the top ten German cities in terms of adoption of the concept. BCS analysed cities with over 200,000 inhabitants on the basis of ‘car sharing cars per 1,000 head of population’, and found the following: Karlsruhe is the German car sharing capital, followed by Düsseldorf, Munich and Stuttgart. German capital Berlin only manages fifth place, even though it has the highest number of users in absolute numerical terms. The association believes that the ‘time when a car acted as a status symbol is definitely over’. It also points out that each car sharing car removes between four and eight private cars from the roads, and helps alleviate parking problems in cities. The first German car sharing scheme began in 1988, a year after the inauguration of the concept in Switzerland (Mobility International). Some 109 of the 140 known German car-sharing schemes are members of BCS.

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STRATEGY

European Commission

SUMP or Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans The SUMP (Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans) project of the European Commission is set to define how European cities will move forward within this domain. Part way through its course, two of its authors – Sebastian Bührmann and Frank Wefering of Rupprecht Consult, mandated with the project, explain the thinking behind SUMP and gave us some details.

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ustainable Urban Mobility Plans as strategies for better urban mobility and quality of life are currently promoted as an idea and concept at European Union level. SUMP is not like a conventional European project where you deliver the final result at the end of the project. It is much more an on-going process within the European Policy framework. It promotes the concept of Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans for the Commission and is funded by the Intelligent Energy Europe programme.

What did the Commission ask you to do and what are the first objectives?

Bührmann & Wefeing: “The European Commission sees Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans as playing a major role in solving mobility problems in European cities. The Commission could go down the route of making such plans mandatory, via a directive, but at the moment they are just looking at this possibility. In various countries – France and the UK for example, these kind of plans are mandatory by law. We have found that where these exist within some sort of legal framework, it really helps and fosters a culture of Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning. The Commission is also considering linking regional development and cohesion funds to cities and regions that have submitted a current independently validated Urban Mobility Performance and Sustainability Audit certificate.

Our project is scheduled to run from 2010 to 2013 and is part of the Eltisplus project, which also deals with the largest European information portal of urban mobility (www.eltis.org).

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Sebastian Bührmann: “We have been able to ensure that people all over Europe have been trained in how to set up plans.”

Frank Wefering: “We are not at a level of individual companies, but an over-arching integrated urban approach.”

Promoting Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans in New Member States is also very much a priority. Our task is to develop a guidance document for urban transport planners, detailing how to develop Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans and including minimum criteria to be fulfilled. We have also developed a state of the art report together with other partners, and we are carrying out awareness raising events and technical training.”

Where do you operate?

Bührmann & Wefeing: “We operate all over Europe, around 29 countries are covered in the project. We have therefore been able to ensure that people all over Europe have been trained in how to set up plans. Training and awareness raising activities are still being carried out.”

What is the potential impact of SUMP on business?

Bührmann & Wefeing: “Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning is not the same as mobility management in the way companies look at this subject now. We are not at a level of individual companies, but an over-arching integrated urban approach.

This will usually be drawn up by a public authority and includes participatory elements, a pledge to sustainability, integration of different policy areas for an entire conurbation, clear vision, objectives and measurable targets as well as a review of transport costs and benefits.

“Businesses need an environment and a quality of life in which they can operate efficiently and prosper.”

Bührmann & Wefeing, SUMP

SUMP is very important for businesses because they need an environment and a quality of life in which they can operate efficiently and prosper. Companies which have good plans as part of sustainable mobility policies also benefit in terms of the health of their personnel. Furthermore, we also see that cities which have SUMPs in operation are quite successful in attracting service industries in particular.”

Can you give some examples?

Bührmann & Wefeing: “In Cologne, we see companies becoming very involved in planning urban mobility. There is a new section of tram-line which was built to go directly to a new business area.

Ikea was one of the main sponsors in making this happen. Everyone benefits – the clients, the city, Ikea itself…

The proliferation of public bike sharing systems in so many cities, sponsored by private companies, is another obvious example of this. These examples contribute to the positive image of the businesses involved. Investment often comes from a mixture of public and private sources, therefore.

We spoke about the possibility of this domain becoming mandatory, but many cities are working on a voluntary basis and having success. Ghent in Belgium is a good example. They are working hard on sustainable mobility which has transformed the image of Ghent as a high quality of life city in which to live.

The German city of Freiburg is now quoted as an eco-city. Budapest has transformed its inner city into a more attractive place for living, working and for business. Our own belief is that incentives to establish SUMPs may be able to achieve a lot, including in places without mandatory regulations. It will of course take time for all this to happen.”

Is there any impact on European funding?

Bührmann & Wefeing: “Some funding could be conditional on certified SUMP plans. Cohesion and structural funds involve large sums of money, and the Commission White Paper suggests considering linking these funds to the existence of Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans.

This would be a big driver of course, although it is only at discussion stage at the moment. What has to be borne in mind though, is that not all cities have Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans in place, and some of them would need support to develop their first plan. Cities need equal conditions to access funds that are linked to the existence of a SUMP.” Tim Harrup & Filip Van Mullem

SUMP – Planning for People The report drawn up by Rupprecht Consult is currently 120 pages long, and impossible to summarise here. But a few key phrases can help to illustrate what this far reaching document – entitled ‘Developing and Implementing a Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan’ and sub-titled ‘Planning for People’ – is trying to achieve.

A definition A Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan is a strategic plan designed to satisfy the mobility needs of people and businesses in cities and their surroundings for a better quality of life. It builds on existing planning practices and takes due consideration of integration, participation, and evaluation principles.

Definition of a sustainable transport system A sustainable transport system meets society’s economic, social and environmental needs whilst minimising its undesirable impacts on the economy, society and the environment.

Developing and Implementing a Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan The SUMP method comprises the following tasks: 1. Status analysis and baseline scenario; 2. Definition of a vision, objectives and targets; 3. Selection of policies and measures; 4. Assignment of responsibilities and resources; 5. Arrangements for monitoring and evaluation.

The SUMP guidelines draft, which is very advanced and available as working document, will be finalised in May 2013.

Details of this can be found on www.mobilityplans.eu.

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STRATEGY

Mobility Management

Measuring Value As the capability, availability and acceptance of technology in the workplace gathers pace pioneering corporations are exploring how mobility management can be used to improve business performance.

value is created through the management of travel products and services. This group measure value by; negotiating with suppliers to secure the best price; implementing travel policies to achieve compliance; and optimising processes to improve user experience.

Mobility Managers believe that travel, technology and workspace solutions are inter-connected and that value is compromised if they are not managed together.

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n this article Jonathan Green examines the differences between mobility and travel management, and explores whether Travel Managers need to broaden their horizons, start thinking strategically about how value is created and re-invent themselves as the Mobility Managers of the future.

Understanding mobility management A mobility management strategy is strategic approach to value creation. Mobility Managers operate like management consultants and collaborate with colleagues to understand the outcomes that the business is seeking to achieve. They then advise how travel, technology and workplace solutions can then be configured to deliver these outcomes and improve performance.

Is it time to say bon voyage to travel management?

There is a split emerging amongst professionals in the travel sector. On one side are the traditionalists who believe that

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On the other side, fewer in number but becoming increasingly vocal, are Mobility Managers. These pioneers believe that travel management is in urgent need of an injection of creativity.

Mobility Managers believe that travel, technology and workspace solutions are inter-connected and that value is compromised if they are not managed together.

Understanding, creating and measuring value A Travel Manager operates in a confined space that limits their ability to create of value. The opportunity to create value only arises once a decision has been made to travel. Up until this point the Travel Manager has no influence.

Mobility Managers in contrast are engaged in the design of workplace solutions from the perspective of improving business performance. This creates a space for value creation that is significantly larger.

Creating the environment for change The creation of a model that evidences the value of mobility management does not need to be complex. The first step in any change management project is to create a space for a discussion.

To facilitate a discussion the model of value creation used by travel management professionals can be compared against the principles of mobility management. This approach will highlight the differences between the two and, in turn, enable decision makers to appraise the potential for value that each approach creates.

By reviewing processes from the perspective of outcomes and collaborating with stakeholders Mobility Managers are able to advise how travel, technology and workspace solutions can be configured to improve business performance.

Mobility Managers focus on outcomes By reviewing processes from the perspective of outcomes and collaborating with stakeholders Mobility Managers are able to advise how travel, technology and workspace solutions can be configured to improve business performance.

Travel Managers do not focus on outcomes. By demonstrating the strategic approach of mobility management and contrasting this with the operational focus of travel management, decision makers are presented with a high level overview of the opportunities that exist for value creation.

Mobility Managers are innovators Technology is changing how corporations operate. Innovation is disrupting business models and creating new opportunities for value creation. A Mobility Manager recognises that travel, technology and workplace solutions are inter-connected and have the potential to change how businesses and consumers operate in the future.

A Travel Manager’s vision is blinkered and only extends to innovation in the travel sector. In addition, Travel Managers are unsighted of how change outside of the travel arena could influence business systems and processes in the future.

Mobility managers take a holistic approach to value creation Mobility Managers focuses on the costs incurred of delivering an outcome from the beginning to the end. A Travel Manger focuses solely on the impacts associated with travel, without consideration for costs incurred pre or post travel.

Mobility managers compare and contrast the financial costs associated with different modes of travel and technology, along with the opportunities for designing new workspace solutions and re-engineering business systems and processes to improve business performance.

A Travel Manager concentrates on travel costs, the savings that can be achieved by changing the mode of travel or supplier, and how administrative costs associated with travel can be optimised. By operating in this narrow sphere of influence a Travel Managers ability to appraise the value of alternatives to travel at a strategic and operational level is severely compromised.

This narrow scope of measuring value by Travel Managers operate is compounded when opportunity costs are considered. Mobility managers take a holistic view to the costs incurred in delivering a business strategy and improving performance. They appreciate that there are non-financial costs, like employee productivity and health and wellbeing, which need to be accounted for along with social and environmental factors that could impact the success and reputation of the corporation.

Travel Managers with their narrow remit are frequently unsighted of strategic considerations. Even if they are aware they have little ability to influence.

Mobility Managers have a remit to implement strategic change The space that Mobility Managers occupy is one of strategic business improvement. As technology evolves, travel and technology converges and corporations see increasingly levels of value in a mobility strategy, the value that travel management presents becomes increasingly questionable.

If today’s Travel Managers are to add value in an increasingly tech savvy world where mobile communications are reinventing the workplace, they will need to start the process of re-inventing themselves as the Mobility Managers of the future.

Jonathan Green, Partner 3SIXTY

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STRATEGY

Mobility Management

Moving from a Travel Programme to Mobility Management The integration of travel and video based solutions Pioneering corporations are beginning to manage business travel and video solutions under a single strategy to improve business performance. In this article Jonathan Green explores why travel and video solutions are coming together and discusses how the barriers to integration are being pulled down.

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ioneering corporations are beginning to manage business travel and video solutions under a single strategy to improve business performance. In this article Jonathan Green explores why travel and video solutions are coming together and discusses how the barriers to integration are being pulled down.

Has the time come to talk as well as travel?

In business effective communication is the centre stone of successful relationships. For Mobility Managers the integration of video alongside travel is essential if a mobility management strategy is to be successful.

Mobility Managers understand that travel and video solutions are simply enablers that allow people to talk.

Given this understanding Mobility Managers are able to delve deeper than their business travel counterparts and ask; (a) how can video solutions be designed to complement travel programmes? (b) how can video based solutions replace travel? And critically; (b) how can video solutions be used to re-engineer systems and process and improve business performance?

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Breaking down the barriers Meeting in person is essential and video solutions will not make business travel programmes redundant. The complimentary nature of the two solutions is the space that Mobility Managers are seeking to exploit.

There are three headline reasons why the integration of video and travel solutions has proved challenging. Firstly, ownership of travel and video solutions has been fragmented. Secondly, the supply chain has been unable to present video and travel content holistically and thirdly, a cultural shift in attitudes is needed if the capability of video is to be fully explored.

Ownership A Travel Managers approach to creating value is very narrow. This is because a travel programme focuses on the consequence of a decision to travel and not the reasons for travel. Similarly teams responsible for video solutions measure value by providing video technology and maintaining it.

A Mobility Manager operates in a different realm. They explore, in collaboration with business partners, how travel and video solutions can improve business

Following the launch of the world’s first global reservation systems for video the landscape is slowly changing.

performance. This approach means that a Mobility Manager is able to create and appraise value from the perspective of achieving outcomes.

Showing the way Participants in the 1 in 5 Challenge, a WWF-UK scheme to reduce business flights, are providing an early evidence base of the value of video solutions.

The challenge members’, including Cap Gemini, BSKYB and Balfour Beatty, have decreased flights by 19% and expenditure by 17% over a 2 year period by promoting video solutions.

David Nassbaum, Chief Executive of WWF-UK, wrote in the 2nd One in Five report, “In our vision for the future, companies can make the most of expert project teams based around the world but they won’t have to board a plane to do so. The 1 in 5 Challenge is all about helping business and government to make this transition.”

Identifying video solutions, comparing costs and booking video has been frustrating experience for proponents of mobility management.

Following the launch of the world’s first global reservation systems for video the landscape is slowly changing. Sabre Travel Network has recently announced the launch of its virtual meeting platform and claims its solution will be available to millions of business travellers and more than 220,000 travel agents worldwide. Greg Webb of Sabre said, “One of the biggest challenges […] faced is the inability to search, book and connect video conferencing systems. Sabre Virtual Meetings solves that and makes it easy to set up internal video conferencing meetings and connect private-topublic or public-to-public rooms.”

As video and travel content comes together booking a video will soon be as easy as booking an airline ticket. This will allow users to make comparisons between travel and video and, as a result, videos value will become increasingly visible.

Mobility Managers are spearheading this transition. By focusing on outcomes they are challenging the status quo, questioning the role of business travel in organisations and designing a new approach to value creation.

Innovation in the supply chain Until recently it has not been possible to use the same technology to access travel and video content together. As a consequence it has not been possible for users to access, review or book travel and video content seamlessly via integrated online booking solutions.

Travel Management Company’s (TMCs) and hoteliers have been forging partnerships with video providers, though uptake – to date - has been slow. Video presents a complex challenge for TMCs as it cannibalises their core offering of travel products and services. Therefore, if a TMC’s is to actively promote video alongside travel solutions a new reward model is required.

The Value of Change Companies are already making the shift.

Business Travel News named Ikea’s Meeting and Travel Manager Torbjörn Erling as the 2011 Multinational Travel Manager of the Year for a transformation project called “Meet the IKEA way”.

With a slogan of “Meet more, travel less” the project brought together travel, meetings and technology to change the way managers and employees thought about achieving business outcomes.

The approach employed by IKEA will be familiar to Mobility Managers. The results - financial saving, productivity benefits and reduced environmental impacts – will also come as no surprise.

As the experiences of pioneers like IKEA become increasingly visible other corporations will follow and we will begin to see the integration of video and travel solutions materialising at pace.

Jonathan Green, Partner 3SIXTY

Scan this QR code to watch WWF’s David Nussbaum and Capgemini’s Christine Hodgson introduce the One in Five Challenge.

Culture for change For video based solutions to be mainstreamed a cultural shift is required.

Business people will need to be educated on the appropriateness of travel over video and vice versa, the capability of video will need to be demonstrated and the value it creates evidenced.

As digital natives enter the workforce video solutions will become increasingly accepted and its value will, in turn, become easier to evidence.

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STRATEGY

B50 Platform

Working & travelling smart in the Netherlands

In the Netherlands a large number of employers, currently involving 800,000 employees, are already linked to “work and travel smart” initiatives.

Fifty CEOs are currently involved in the “Smart Work Smart Travel”(*) platform in The Netherlands. The main objective of what is called the B50 Group is to create a mass interest of employers and employees for the innovative smart work and travel approach.

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he concept proposes employers and employees to first choose not to travel to work one or more days per week. Or if traveling to work is mandatory, that they will not opt for the car in first instance. And if the car is the only solution left, then it should be used outside of rush hours. The employers forming the B50 Group consider that a smarter way of working and traveling not only contributes to a reduction of travel distances and a better accessibility at local and regional level, but also ultimately creates superior country competitiveness as a knowledge economy, improving the investment climate and leading to increased employment.

Focus This approach works, says Annelies Hermens, B50-Chairman and HR, CSR & Sustainability Lead at consulting giant Capgemini. “The dynamics should really come from the employers and are not only a fight against traffic jams. Mind you, she says brightly, the initiative involves much more than just mobility as it concerns sustainability, an attractive workplace and a way to deal with the new generations.” To achieve the planned mass movement acceleration, the focus of the B50 Group is put on four topics: > ICT-Workplace: technology and housing allow to flexibly work wherever the employee wants; > HR-Culture: the “work and travel smart” initiative is an integral part of the labor conditions; > Mobility: a flexible range of mobility related services is available, motivating the employees to change their travel behavior and make smarter choices; > Communication: only professional mass communication will convince people to adopt the “work and travel smart” initiative (portal, ambassadors, media campaigns…)

Status A large number of employers, currently involving 800,000 employees, are already linked to “work and travel smart” initiatives. These initiatives include the use of mobility budgets, an

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increased use of the bicycle to go to work (currently 37,500 people go to work by bike at least 1 day per week), or working on the go, aimed at encouraging the use of workplaces other than those available at the office or at home by sharing for example the workplaces between B50 members. The target of the B50 Group is to reach a million employees embracing the “work and travel smart” approach by end 2012 whereas the greater ambition is to initiate a mass acceleration of the movement, making it irreversible and leading to 2 million converted employees by the end of 2015.

Public-private partnership The Dutch government is an important pillar of the platform. In close cooperation, the stakeholders (employers, regions, government, and labor organizations) now work closely together in order to achieve the structural changes. The Ministry of Infrastructure and Environment supports the B50 objective by injecting € 10 million in the platform for the 2011-2012 period and linking the investment to the public program called “Better Utilization”(**) as a mutual reinforcement. Involving 8 regions, the Minister will further inject over € 1.1 billion in order to optimize the existing infrastructure, reduce the major congestion bottlenecks and encourage people to travel outside peak hours. The package of measures is intended to ultimately reduce the traffic congestion by 20%.

(*) Slim Werken Slim Reizen (**) Beter Benutten

Filip Van Mullem

B50 Group companies: ABN Amro, Accenture, Achmea, Alliander, Alstom, ANWB, Arcadis, Berenschot, BMC Groep, Boer & Croon, Capgemini, Cofely, Conclusion, Connexxion, DHV, E-office, Europ Assistance, IBM, Imtech/ Peek Traffic, ING, KLM, KPN, Microsoft, Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken, NS, Nuon, NXP, PostNL, Rabobank, RDW, Siemens, SNS Reaal, Sogeti, Strukton Civiel, Strukton Rail, T-Mobile, TNO, Twynstra Gudde, UMC Utrecht, Universiteit Utrecht, Univé-UVIT, UWV, Veolia Transport Nederland, Vodafone.

STRATEGY

News

Carlson Wagonlit Travel calls for better ancilliary cost monitoring Carlson Wagonlit Travel has published a report (Mastering the Maze) in which it points out two domains for potential cost savings by corporate travel buyers with respect to air travel. These are in the areas of airline fuel surcharges – which are not generally questioned – and of the ‘out of pocket expenses’ run up by executives when flying on company business, such as extra baggage costs and in-flight meals (where these have to be paid for).

The problem appears to be that companies do not closely monitor these costs, having placed most of the emphasis on ensuring the best deal on the cost of tickets themselves. Negotiating on fuel surcharges and changing traveller behaviour could lead to cost savings, the report believes.

Bike sharing scheme in Lille gets online app Since it was launched in Lille (France) a year ago, the public bicycle sharing scheme has proved to be very successful: more than 4,000 bikes are now in use on the city’s roads.

Available for short (by the hour) or long (a year) rental, the inhabitants of the northern French town have quickly adapted to this ecological and urban mode of transport.

By 2014 there will be more than 10,000 bicycles available to the public. But what was missing was the possibility of renting by smartphone. Transpole, the public transport and V’Lille operator in the Lille metropolitan, area, has thus set up an application for mobile telephones, which has been in operation since April. With a practical drop-down menu, this app enables the situation concerning the bicycle fleet to be seen in real time. Currently developed for the Apple iPhone, the app has also been embedded into the Android store. And it clearly responds to a need, having been downloaded 11,000 times during the May-June start-up period.

New York bike hire scheme on the way Fuel costs and out of pocket expenses can be optimized according to a report form Carlson Wagonlit Travels.

Waymate simplifies travel comparisons An on-line travel platform under the name of ‘Waymate’ is proposing a simpler service for travellers and travel managers. Based in Berlin, Waymate was founded two years ago. It emphasises the fact that by using its platform, it is no longer necessary to continually move from one website to another in order to compare flight availability and prices, or trains, or find the best route by car. Waymate brings the entire process together into what it describes as ‘one easy, convenient and transparent experience’. Booking flights and other transport journeys is also integrated into the platform, once again enabling the user to remain on the same site. Waymate was the winner of the first Smart Mobility Challenge 2012 held by the European Commission.

Citi Bike, the New York bicycle hire scheme will be launched in March 2013.

The New York bicycle hire scheme Citi Bike is now scheduled to be launched in March 2013, the initial date having been set at July 2012. There will be around 10,000 bikes available for rent from some six hundred of stations located around the city. Users can pick up the bikes at one station and return them to another.

The New York scheme is to some degree modelled on the successful Velib’ and Barclays Cycle Hire schemes already in operation in Paris and London respectively.

More news on www.smart-mobilitymanagement.com smart mobility management - n°7 I 29

case studies

Arcadis

Mobility theory put to practice Even though Arcadis is a widespread multinational with branches in 13 countries, it is not unthinkable you will never have heard of them. But their ideas and daily realisations are familiar to all of us since their field of experience stretches from environment over water to buildings and… mobility. And they put their money where their mouth is.

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hen you read the 54 do’s and don’ts of Arcadis on the new way of working, you realise that these people have sustainability in their soul. After all, the eventual purpose of this list is to find a new and more efficient way of balancing time, mobility and means resulting in a economically en ecologically more acceptable footprint of both the company and the individual employees.

The ultimate goal of this new way of working as Arcadis promotes it, is a result-driven management that is based on mutual understanding and tangible results. Of course this often requires a complete turnaround of the way of thinking throughout the complete organisation, from management to every employee involved, but the resulting benefits are not to be neglected. Their new way of working therefore focuses on people, processes and organisation. Changing is not a goal in itself and not everybody is supposed to agree, but Arcadis is convinced that the necessary changes can be reasonably understood and accepted by all parties involved. Listing all of these 54 do’s and don’ts plus their potential would lead us to far, better have a look at how Arcadis puts the theory into practice.

Adapting the lay-out of the offices in function of the tasks that need to be performed can generate savings up to 30% in workfloor surface.

smart mobility management - n°7 I 30

A step by step approach First of all Arcadis introduced an evaluation system based on results whereby not the presence of an employee is to be taken into account but the output of each one of them. This change is as much a challenge for managers who have to understand how vital it is that their employees need to know exactly what is expected of them, as it is for the employees themselves who are responsible for the organisation of their proper part of the job. They are basically free to work where and when they want just as long as their part of the job gets done the way it should be.

>

Arcadis introduced an efficient evaluation system based on results whereby not the presence of the employee is taken into account but the output of each one of them.

Secondly Arcadis invested considerably in a powerful ITsection able so support working from different sources and in different places. The desired mobility inevitably requires that every employee can be reached when needed (no more fix phones, only mobiles) and that he or she is fully equipped to work on the agreed results from the office as well as from home. Home-working and teleconferencing are indeed as much a part of the new working process as the next meeting in the office.

Concerning those offices… the fact that not all employees turn up at the office every single day at the same time means that the offices themselves need to be reorganised as to offer a maximum of flexibility all of the time. The pay-off of such a reorganisation is that less office surface is needed. Arranging the lay-out of a building and its offices in function of the tasks that need to be performed generally translate into a saving of 20 to 30 percent in surface!

Down-down Last but not least, Arcadis demanded from its managers to act as ambassadors of the new working concept. Arcadis very much believes in a top-down approach meaning that the willingness to convert and the change itself has to come from

the management team. Their belief in the reorganisation is not just essential, it is the very start of such a long-term project. In practice this meant the managers had to give up their proper office space, had to start focusing on a different way of evaluating, be result-driven and make sure the whole process would be accepted throughout their team. This meant all managers needed to be enthusiastic about the concept and know it inside out in order to be able to explain and counsel their part of the organisation during the implementation and in order to be able to evaluate that same part after implementing the new way of working. On top of that they had to guarantee that all employees found an acceptable balance between private and professional time, and that a close follow-up of all new agreements was observed.

Of course Arcadis didn’t introduce all these changes at once.

Some of their proper list of do’s and don’ts simply do not apply to their own company and that is exactly how this new way of working guideline should be interpreted. It is not a holy grail kind of bible you need to follow meticulously, but merely a foretaste of how our modern times can lead to a progressive way of working.

Dirk Steyvers

Essent case study in figures Since the introduction of the new way of working by Arcadis energy-supplier Essent realised: > 15% increase in productivity > 20% decrease in sick leave > 9% increase in employee satisfaction (balance private-professional) > 30% decrease in driven miles and emitted CO2 > 30% decrease in office volume (share rate of 0,6 fte/workplace)

smart mobility management - n°7 I 31

case studies

Delhaize

Delhaize Three-pronged mobility attack As a major supermarket chain, Delhaize has three distinct areas on which to concentrate its mobility plan. Davy Decock, Mobility Coordinator for Delhaize, explains how this works, and how even the company’s customers are part of the plan.

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upermarket chains, of which Delhaize is one of the largest in its home country of Belgium, are different from most other types of business, inasmuch as they have millions of customers who actually visit their premises – which is not the case for other mass market suppliers such as telephone operators… So how does Delhaize make its mobility plan work in these conditions?

What are the main elements of your mobility policy?

Davy Decock: We have a mobility strategy and a mobility action plan 2012-2015 with different focus areas. We focus on customers, on staff, and on freight transport. These are three domains and we have initiatives in all of them. Sustainability is a pillar of Delhaize’s strategy.

Let’s start with freight, as you obviously have substantial deliveries to make to the stores.

Davy Decock: We are investing in the PIEK project, which means we are investing in silent deliveries. We have a greater spread of our goods and lower emissions, quieter vehicles and better traffic safety. We are especially focusing on noise emissions, to generate less nuisance for local inhabitants. We are therefore investing in our local store infrastructure and in our transport vehicles and transpallets. We are working with compressed natural gas (CNG)-trailers and we are putting a lot of effort into driver behaviour . Another factor we are taking into account and trying to solve is traffic congestion. So we are spreading our deliveries in terms of timing, not just hitting the morning rush hour for example. By definition a lot of our stores are in densely populated areas with a lot of traffic. Avoiding having two goods vehicles arriving at the same time is a priority because it generates nuisance for our neighbours. We are using the new type of double-deck trailer for more efficient

smart mobility management - n°7 I 32

deliveries. Another very important aspect is safety in our store car parks, especially when trucks need to manoeuvre in these.

Whenever I go to a store I observe the behaviour of everyone using the car park to see if any modifications need to be made.

The priority actions therefore involve infrastructure, transport vehicles, transpallets and driver behaviour.

Are your warehouses and suppliers involved in this?

Davy Decock: Yes, we have two main warehousing centres for Belgium, in Zellik and Ninove, and we have, for example, a project to diminish the number of empty trips by trucks. So when a truck has delivered to a store, it can then go to a supplier’s premises, pick up more goods, and deliver these to the warehouse. We believe that over the past two years we have avoided around 5 million kilometres of travel through better logistics and backhauling, with all the benefits in terms of fuel costs and emissions.

Electric cars are making an appearance in the company fleet.

About Delhaize A familiar sight in Belgium, where Delhaize was founded in 1883, the country now only provides around a quarter of the companies revenues. The majority (68%) of the twenty billion Euros or so revenues come from the United States, and Delhaize obtains the rest of its turnover in nine other countries. Worldwide employment is around 138,000. The sustainable development policy of the company extends to its food ranges, with ‘bio’ products to be found in every type of food on sale. Since 2007, all of the electricity used

by Delhaize comes from renewable sources.

Let’s talk about your staff.

Davy Decock: We have a lot of measures in place to reduce the environmental impact of staff travel, and one of the main elements is free public transport. Everyone who works for Delhaize in Belgium is able to benefit from free public transport.

We have a national policy for this. Where company cars are concerned, more polluting vehicles are being phased out and we have started to introduce 4 electric vehicles to use as pool cars – amongst others. There are 2 Opel Ampera’s in the car park. If someone comes by public transport and then needs to go somewhere for work, he can use one of these.

Do you have satellite offices?

Davy Decock: Yes, and we have a very good policy on local recruitment. The best way to avoid traffic is to have the place of work and the home close together. This is also why we introduced a bike project. Any member of staff who wants to decrease their environmental footprint and who can respect the conditions of the bike charter and move around sustainably can have a free Delhaize bike. We are also improving cyclists’ facilities with more bike parking for example. The takeup has been very good – we tested the scheme in the Ninove centre and from an original 5% of people coming to work by bike, we now have 13%. Because of this success we have now launched the project nationally Can company cars and free public transport be taken together?

Davy Decock: We started by offering the free transport just to people without a company car, but now those with a company car can also take advantage, by opting for a less expensive car. It is also possible to downgrade the car and take a salary increase.

Davy Decock with a Delhaize bike – offered to any employee who wishes to come to work on two wheels.

This is a move towards a mobility budget then.

Davy Decock: Yes, in fact, it is. We are moving in this direction, and expect to announce some more initiatives in this domain soon. There are certain test projects going on. Further investigation into the combining of company cars and free public transport and how this can work, is part of it. We will see how we can best apply any sort of mobility budget, and as always we test it first and get people’s reactions before applying it – not the other way around!

You obviously have more customers than staff, and you said they are being involved too. How? Davy Decock: Well for example we are working with some NGO’s such as Fietsersbond & GRACQ. We are undertaking some studies with them, and the first concrete result will be in September, when we launch a bike bag for shoppers. This will be distributed in store and be a bag which shoppers can use on their own bikes – alongside the rear wheels in traditional manner – to take their shopping home. It is designed to be very quick and easy to fit onto and take off the bike. This will make it easier for shoppers to do their shopping by bike.

There will also be more bicycle parking in stores. Our surveys and trials in three stores show that this scheme is very well received by the public and so we are going to roll it out into other stores.

Tim Harrup

“Over the past two years we have avoided around 5 million kilometres of travel.”

Davy Decock, Delhaize Belgium smart mobility management - n°7 I 33

case studies

Euler Hermes

Euler Hermes Root and branch change Euler Hermes, a credit insurer with offices across the world, has become the latest company to embrace the ‘New Way of Work’ in its Belgian office. When opting for a radical change in culture, Euler Hermes set itself (and its architects) a number of criteria: transparency, synergy, flexibility were three key words.

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The wave effect in the Belgian office of Euler Hermes is clean to see and gives a dynamic touch to the workfloor.

Stéphane Vanbever, Facility Manager at Euler Hermes, says that the New Way of Working is related to a better state of mind within the company.

Total investment A clean desk policy now operates, with each employee having a small ‘toolbox’ to store their personal effects at the end of the day. The ‘New Way of Working’ has now convinced the personnel, who were naturally wary at he outset. And the company invested itself totally in this radical and fundamental change in thinking. This even began with the selection of a partner to design and build the new offices. Having first looked at some of the traditional interior designers, Euler Hermes decided that

smart mobility management - n°7 I 34

© Marie Bourgonjon

uler Hermes recently moved three hundred metres from its previous offices in the Brussels European district, to begin an entirely new chapter in its existence. The workspace is quite unlike anything seen before – open, bright spaces with innovative seating concepts, no visible cupboards, no closed in offices… Each of the seven departments works around a ‘hub’, there are informal meeting spaces, a network café. Subtle, changing colours enhance the principally white décor. To prepare its personnel for what is a root and branch change in company working culture – especially for an eighty-year-old organisation – Euler Hermes undertook a period of ‘psychological training’ during the works. The personnel were invited to come and see the work in progress, a large screen in the existing offices showed the work being carried out, and a copy of one of the new hubs was built in the old offices to familiarise staff with what they were moving into.

radical ends require radical means. And so the commission was awarded to a very small Brussels bureau ‘RoseStudio’.

“They fully understood what we were looking for and invested themselves 100% in the project – night and day sometimes”, explained Facility Manager Stéphane Vanbever.

There is an elevated wave design in the central areas, with people sitting below. Flex-desk use has been instigated where appropriate the personnel just logs in to the fixed phone wherever

“A copy of one of the new hubs was built in the old offices.”

Stéphane Vanbever, Euler Hermes they happen to sit. Computers are not individually assigned and there will be a move towards laptops. Pictogrammes, rather than traditional signs, are used to show the various different office and relaxation areas. There is more use made of video-conferencing and conference calls. And for meetings requiring a large number of people all in one room together, there is an astonishing, custom-made, eight metre long white table in the (glass partitioned of course) ‘board room’.

Mobility move is crucial Mobility was indeed a major criterion: there is a metro station right outside the front door, and around 50% of the personnel come to work by public transport. There is a move towards a mobility budget rather than simply a company car.

from there rather than having to travel to Brussels as they do now. So in terms of mobility, this quite simply means that there will be less travel taking place.

This move also benefits our customers, as the majority of them are in fact located in the Flemish region. For the employees concerned, there is also an advantage in terms of the work-life balance.”

How has this ‘New Way of Working’ impacted on your clients?

“I have spoken to many of our employees who have direct contact with clients – sales and underwriting staff for example. They feel that communication takes place more quickly than it did before, and this is related to a better state of mind within the company, more focused on the customer.”

increased. We certainly make use of the network coffee facility. We use these new facilities all the time. This has been like fresh air going through the organisation. Our previous building somehow formed part of the DNA of our organisation as it had been our headquarters for so long. So there was some degree of sadness at leaving it, but the bubble of oxygen the new building brought was felt immediately. It has increased the energy in our organisation and our contact with customers. I think that in six months in the new building we have seen more customers than in two years in the old one! We are proud to invite customers into our new building.

Openness, communication, these are corporate words, but you can really feel them here in the building.”

Tim Harrup

The ‘New Way of Working’ has been entirely embraced by Euler Hermes, and includes ecological concepts. For example, there is a shift towards paperless working, with a radical reduction in the number of printers to be found in the offices. The figures here are exceptional. Within six weeks of moving in to the new offices, the number of sheets printed each day had reduced from around 2,000 to 700.

Stéphane Vanbever sums up the effect of the ‘New Way of Working’ six months into the project: How has mobility evolved since the beginning ?

Stéphane Vanbever: “Well on top of what we have done here in Brussels we have established eight hubs in Ghent, which will enable several company employees to work out of Ghent. This means that some of our employees who live in the Ghent area can now work

How has your own daily working life changed?

“It is very interesting because when you decide to make a move and a change like ours, you set out a lot of things on paper which are basically concepts.

One of the concepts is that there will be more flexible cooperation between all the people. We were able to see that really did happen, from the first day, and we already saw a lot of informal meetings taking place. The level of communication between colleagues has definitely

About Euler Hermes Euler Hermes a credit insurer with 54 branches across the world. Part of the Allianz group, its prime task is therefore to assist in the commercial development of companies by ensuring that these companies select solvent clients with the ability to pay. It also helps in debt collection where necessary. The company turns over around 2 billion Euros and employs 6,000 persons worldwide.

A word from rosestudio Stéphane Vanbever, Euler Hermes: “For a space to communicate, there has to be a strong idea running through all levels of that space. In this way, it expresses the values of the company. We therefore created a dynamic motive which is used in the partitioning, on the floor, in the furnishing and in the signposting. Apart from the large meeting rooms, the space is open and transparent with meeting areas called ‘hubs’. These were designed in the form of a wave on which everyone can surf, meet and inter-relate or withdraw. Conviviality between colleagues therefore reappears. The graphic chart was also used to bring vitality to the various departments: red, blue, green and orange.”

smart mobility management - n°7 I 35

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industry

Two-wheeled mobility

The Segway is taking Lille city by storm It started in the US, of course, but the Segway phenomenon has now reached Europe, spreading through France, Belgium, the Netherlands and other countries. The Segway is more than simply a means of urban transport; it’s a clever, playful and eco-friendly tool recreation and communications tool. Its debut in the northern French city of Lille is showing a lot of promise.

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t’s now been 10 years since the Segway corporation in New Hampshire produced the revolutionary two-wheeler that took the streets of the great American cities by storm. Today, via franchise holder Mobilboard, the Segway is present in 15 European countries. In France alone, there are 40 branches. An earlier attempt at introducing the Segway in Lille via the public transport system Transpole failed.

But a Mobilboard branch, established in the city in 2011, has proved more successful. “We started out with 12 Segways, and we’ve recently upped the number to 20, as we couldn’t keep up with demand”, says Michel Krysiecki, the local Mobilboard manager. The Lille branch is developing three activities: leisure, corporate incentives, and event communication. “For leisure, we primarily work with groups for whom we develop package deals, especially for our Belgian customers: we rent out Segways to groups from 10 to 15 people, for a duration of 3 to 4 hours, with an instructor of ours to supervise, and a pub meal in the middle of the excursion.” The initiation is easy: 15 minutes’ instruction suffices to teach novices how to drive, stop and turn. Even if the Segway is considered an extension of ‘pedestrian’ traffic, it can still reach up to 20 km/h, and helmets are manda-

A common scene in Lille today: tourist groups are crisscrossing the city on Segway.

tory. “For groups on urban excursion, we limit the speed to 6 km/h. This allows us to welcome any type of customer. Last week we had an 81-year-old man take his first Segway ride!”

Business seminars and banners To attract customers from the UK, Belgium, the Netherlands - and of course France itself - Mobilboard has developed game rallies, including a ‘road book’, to allow them to discover Lille. “This formula is taking off very fast, thanks to our website (www.mobilboard. com) and our presence on Facebook”, says Michel Krysiecki.

Corporate incentives are another concept under development. Staff meetings and business seminars could benefit from a two-hour group excursion by Segway. “This formula already represents 40% of our turnover”, says Krysiecki. And the event business is also booming: “We can arrive at an event with 15 Segways, carrying banners - that

makes for a very spectacular, modern and trendy entrance. If so desired, we can also customise the Segway’s body and the wheels.” Obviously this novel mode of urban transport is not free. It will set you back €45 for two hours, and €55 per person for a group, which includes a guide, a road book, etc.

So why is the Segway proving to be such a success?

“Well, because it’s an eco-friendly, completely silent mode of transport (which recharges just like any laptop); because it’s very pedestrian-friendly, in training and in practice; because it represents smart travel, allowing to target distant urban destinations without getting tired; and let’s not forget it’s great fun.

After a few minutes of trepidation, our customers love their Segway, the feeling of riding on a magic carpet to their destinations. Once you’ve tried the Segway, you’ll love it.”

Philippe Martin

smart mobility management - n°7 I 37

industry

Rail

Productive Mobility The train takes you there The growth of high-speed rail networks like Eurostar and Thalys, and the increasingly cumbersome security checks at airports, are drawing more and more passengers from plane to train. A comprehensive study by EPSA confirms rail’s competitive advantage for trips inside Europe.

The opportunity to work on board, with access to free wifi, is one of the major arguments for Thalys’ productive mobility.

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PSA is an independent research company specialising in ‘non-production’ purchases and expenses - notably business trips. Its study was commissioned by Thalys International. But the Brusselsbased rail company wasn’t really taking a great risk: its network smoothly and swiftly connects Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam and Cologne. No, the study’s real value lies in the fact that it moves beyond merely accounting for travel cost and travel time. It quantifies a more fluid concept: the productivity of the business traveller.

smart mobility management - n°7 I 38

First, let’s talk money. The results are clear: Thalys wins, hands down. Between economy class on airplanes and 2nd class via Thalys, EPSA calculates a cost differential of about 68%. This is taking into account the fact that people will sooner take a taxi to the airport and public transport to the train station, as it is usually located in the centre of a city. But more surprisingly, the difference still represents an average cost reduction of 53% for rail if we compare with Thalys Comfort 1, a formula that includes meals, free wifi and the option to reserve a private rail car.

Outlets and added-value tasks

Travel time advantage And the airplane option doesn’t even have a travel time advantage. It’s true that on routes between Paris and Amsterdam and Paris and Cologne, the airplane remains faster (even including travel to and from airports, and pre and post boarding time) - but not by much. In other Thalys routes, it’s a draw between train and plane. On the Brussels-Paris route, the train even is faster.

The study gets very interesting where it goes into the details of so-called ‘productive mobility’. For a business traveller, the trip between, say, Paris and Amsterdam represents a total investment of €476, compared to €710 by plane. Taking into account the aspects ‘cost’ and ‘time’, as specified above, the trip by Thalys is a third cheaper than the same one via plane.

But the study also attempts to quantify the potential for productivity offered by the different types of transport. On this point, the travel managers surveyed for this study are virtually unanimous: 90% consider productivity on rail to be excellent, but only 6% would say the same for productivity on planes.

Even better: 68% of the managers surveyed believe that a businessperson can do professional work on the train for more than half the travel time. Only 4% thought the same about airplanes. Plenty of objective criteria support this discrepancy - for starters: the ease of access to a power outlet.

Better productivity on short trips If we then factor in that, with respect to CO2 emissions, the train crushes the competition of plane and car, it doesn’t take a genius to realise rail’s enormous lead over the competition.

This is confirmed by Paul Tilstone, European Managing Director of the Global Business Travel Association (GBTA): “Obviously, companies find it very important to calculate the ‘total cost of trip’, factoring in the ticket price, the ecological footprint, and the total travel time when picking the type of travel. The choice may depend on the distance to airport terminals or train stations, the time of year, and the type of traveller. At present, we don’t yet have a system to quantify these costs reliably for each and every trip. But at GBTA, we do support complete intermodality, and gladly acknowledge that the train provides an excellent option for productivity on short trips.”

>T he survey’s most original aspect is its evaluation of business traveller productivity. Not only 72 companies, but also hundreds of travellers were surveyed. As mentioned, 90% of managers consider rail’s productivity potential to be very good, versus only 6% for air travel. > I n order of importance, managers and travellers alike rate as their top travel criteria: proximity of power outlets, internet connection, silence, the ability to make phone calls. Following these: proximity to point of departure (whether airport or train station), presence of work stations, quality of waiting area. >T he study goes further, quantitatively and qualitatively.

Almost all business travellers work at least some of the time on Thalys, one out of two works at least half of the travel time: current tasks, making calls, sending and receiving emails, and most of all, ‘value-added tasks’ (49% ‘often’, 36% ‘occasionally’) and preparing meetings (87% in total)! >T his degree of productive mobility is revolutionary - and obviously linked to new technology: 40% use smartphones on the train, 45% do paperwork, and 88% use their computer or tablet. > I n conclusion, even if cost remains the number one criterium for managers to choose the mode of transport (53%), productivity already represents 13%. There’s no doubt that for travel managers, this percentage - and the appeal of the train - is set to increase.

Bart Vanham, a specialist in mobility taxation, concurs: “It’s clear that on routes inside Europe, trains provide better productivity than planes.”

Does this mean Thalys can rest on its laurels? No, says Franck Gervais, Thalys International’s CEO: “We will continue to optimise our lead, and improve travellers’ preference for Thalys because it is faster, more efficient, better value for money, and more productive. But this study should also motivate us to work more on intermodality, to re-think our habits in order to construct a European-wide transportation ecosystem that business and individuals need.”

Philippe Martin

The Thalys/EPSA study is available in full on www.thalys.com

smart mobility management - n°7 I 39

industry

Air Travel

©Airbus

Not just green, but greener Can air travel ever be green? New evidence from the major players in the airplane industry indicates that it can continue to reduce CO2 emissions, thus becoming if not green, then at least greener than before.

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wo mechanisms are at work here: the airline industry’s technological side, represented by the manufacturers of airplanes and their engines, and its operational side, i.e. the airlines and the organisations that control their movements - for Europe, this is Eurocontrol in Brussels (see separate article). Manufacturing builds equipment that produces as little emissions as is technologically possible; operations works to keep actual emissions as close to that technological minimum as possible.

Airbus Manufacturing’s two giants, Airbus and Boeing, both work hard to produce ‘greener’ airplanes. Airbus wants to improve fuel efficiency by 1,5% every year to 2020; cap net carbon emissions from 2020 onwards; and reduce them

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by 2050 to 25% of 2005 levels. Over 90% of Airbus Research & Technology’s budget goes towards eco-friendly measures, such as developing new aircraft technologies, improving modern Air Traffic Management (coupling the increase in traffic with a decrease of its ecological impact), and implementing alternative-fuel value chains. The European consortium is also committed to Flightpath 2050, which targets a 75% reduction in emissions of CO2, 90% of nitrogen oxide (NOX) and 65% of noise by 2050.

The culmination of all that research is the Airbus A350XWB, an airplane that consumes 25% less fuel than current aircraft. Designed to be eco-efficient from gate to gate, it will be the leading environmental performer in the longrange market. It operates with a comfortable margin from the norms set by

current CAEP6 regulations: 99% below its hydrocarbons (HC) limit, 86% below its carbon monoxyde (CO) limit, 60% below its smoke limit, and 35% below its nitrogen oxide (NOX) limit. And it’s quiet too!

Airbus wants first choice of biofuels For Airbus, alternative fuels have been shown to work, and the air travel industry should get first choice, as it has no other viable options beyond fossil fuels. But the company does not approve of ‘firstgeneration’ biofuels, from materials like palm oil, which can be used as food. Airbus now wants to speed up commercial use of jet-grade biofuels to meet its carbon targets (see above).

An Airbus A350XWB under construction in the company’s Toulouse plant.

Putting it into practice In October, Airbus and Air France completed what has been dubbed “the world’s greenest commercial flight ever”. The Airbus A321 flight from Toulouse to Paris put into practice elements in the Airbus road map, such as alternative fuel, optimised air traffic management, and ‘green navigation’. The result: a 50% drop in CO2 emissions.

Lufthansa carried out a biofuel experiment with an A321 on the Hamburg to Frankfurt route. For six months, one of the plane’s two engines was fuelled by the maximum allowed proportion (50%) of biosynthetic kerosene.

A Frankfurt to Washington flight with 40 tonnes of biokerosene was also completed successfully. These experiments avoided the emission of 38 tonnes of CO2 .

Boeing On the American side of the Atlantic, Boeing is also keen on ‘green’, using advanced materials, more fuel-efficient engines, new wing designs and improved aerodynamics for an ecofriendlier performance. For its part, the Boeing 747-8 reduces noise by 30%, and provides double-digit improvements in fuel economy and carbon emissions as compared to previous 747s. The Inter-

continental version carries more people further, on less fuel, noise and pollution. The Freighter version brings those improvements to the cargo industry.

Thanks to its composite fuselage and wings, the 787 Dreamliner achieves a 20% increase in fuel efficiency over airplanes of similar size. It is also much more environmentally progressive throughout its product life-cycle, as fewer hazardous materials are used to produce it. The Dreamliner is a lso quieter than any previous plane of its size.

The 737 MAX was officially launched in 2011, promising airlines a 13% reduction in fuel consumption (and a comparable reduction in CO2 emissions) over today’s most fuel-efficient single-aisle airplane, the Next-Generation 737. The improvement is down to design updates, which also include the latest noise-reduction technology.

Engines Both the Boeing 787 Dreamliner and the Airbus A350XWB are fitted with Rolls-Royce engines. So, what are they doing to make air travel greener? For the Airbus plane, Rolls-Royce developed the Trent XWB engine, using 3D aerodynamics, low-emissions combustion and weight-saving technology to reduce fuel consumption. The result

is the most efficient large civil aerospace engine ever produced, with a 16% improvement in fuel efficiency over the first Trent engine. For the Dreamliner, Rolls-Royce also used 3D aerodynamics, making the fan blades, compressor and turbine aerofoils more efficient and less noisy. The resulting Trent 1000 engine is 12% more efficient than the Trent 800, first used in 1996. All these percentages really add up, says Ric Parker, Research & Technology Director at Rolls-Royce: “If we could replace a previous generation of planes overnight, for example the 767 with the 787, we could save over $1,5 billion in fuel costs and 5 million tonnes of CO2 every year.”

Tim Harrup & Filip Van Mullem

Boeing’s shrinking carbon footprint Boeing’s carbon footprint increased in 2011, but only due to increased aircraft production - the overall footprint has been decreasing since 2007. Since then, Boeing’s absolute CO2 emissions have decreased by 3% (7% on a revenue-adjusted basis). Also, the company’s energy use has gone down by 1% (4%), hazardous-waste generation has decreased by 17% (19%), and water intake by 9% (12%).

“If we could replace a previous generation of planes overnight, for example the 767 with the 787, we could save over $1,5 billion in fuel costs and 5 million tonnes of CO2 every year.”

Ric Parker, Rolls-Royce smart mobility management - n°7 I 41

industry

Air Travel

Eurocontrol making air travel greener while keeping it safe Safety remains air traffic control’s number one job, but it can also help cut CO2 emissions, thus making air travel greener.

Andrew Watt, Head of Environment at Eurocontrol, explains how it’s done.

Andrew Watt underlines the ‘greening’ effect of Eurocontrol’s measures.

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urocontrol tis the European network manager for air traffic control. We work with national governments, airports and navigation service providers to plan flights within this Europewide network. In doing so, we’re already implementing ‘green’ measures”, says mister Watt.

Continuous descent “Another successful measure is continuous descent: the idea is for a plane to come out of cruise flight at a point called ‘top of descent’, and then simply glide down to land, with its engines throttled back to 30% power.

This isn’t as easy as it sounds.

With a majority of the 28.000 daily flights in Europe centred on the core cities of London, Frankfurt, Paris, Amsterdam, Milan and Zurich, descending planes often have to go into level flight for safety reasons. This involves firing the engines, causing more noise and costing more fuel.

Still, we have over 80 airports offering continuous descent at least some of the day. This has proved so successful that our target of 100 airports offering the option by 2013 has been upgraded to 200 by 2014”.

Emissions trading Eurocontrol also fulfils a crucial role for the coming cap-and-trade emissions trading scheme for the aviation industry: “A similar system, with the auctioning and trading of emissions rights, is already in place for heavy industry. In 2013, cap-and-trade for airlines will kick off, based on this year’s data, as provided by Eurocontrol. We monitor and calculate the emissions of the airlines operating in Europe and provide this information to the European governments. Our crossborder approach is essential: an airline may be registered in one particular state, but operate a large part of its flights between other states. Without our input, it would be very difficult for the host state to establish its exact level of CO2 emissions.”

Filip Van Mullem

“We transfer delays to the ground - where the engines remain switched off, as opposed to delays in the air, where the engines are on full blast!”

Andre Watt, Eurocontrol

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