How the biggest Austrian mobility provider succeeds with their intrapreneurship program
The second batch of the ÖBB innovation program ended with a demo day on Dec. 9th, making it the perfect timing to recap the key program highlights from throughout 2019. In the last 9 months, 4 teams from different subgroups have worked intensively on innovative projects to develop them from an idea concept into tested pilots.
Promoting innovation company-wide is a challenge for many corporates.
To tackle this, ÖBB established an Open Innovation team that supports and promotes innovation via an intrapreneurship program that utilizes internal innovation potential through interdisciplinary sub-group teams and use cases. As a result, ÖBB creates innovative mindsets and pushes ideas through the use of design thinking methods and applied prototyping, enabling idea concepts to turn into tested prototypes and pilots.
This year, 17 innovative heads were selected via an open call and were grouped in diverse teams that were (if required) complemented by external specialists and startups.
Developing new mobility services successfully.
Looking back on two years of the ÖBB innovation program, we can proudly say that two of last year´s projects have been implemented and have been launched as a new revenue stream. The ÖBB Postbus Shuttle solves the last mile problem and the underserved micro-mobility market in rural areas with an on-demand solution. Two running pilots are recently in place, with many more waiting for rollout. GPS Ticketing revolutionizes the public transport ticketing process through a GPS tracking mobile app – nationwide applicability under review.
These success stories show the potential of innovative solutions and the relevance of user-centric products in the mobility industry. Furthermore, they show how fruitful the collaboration of startups and corporates can be and what new opportunities this opens. With this, we are excited about our next innovation projects and the future of mobility.
By the way, the new batch is about to start soon!
More buzz around the ÖBB innovation program can be found here:
- Postbus Shuttle Webpage: https://www.postbus.at/unsere-leistungen/postbus-shuttle.html
- DerBrutkasten, Article “Postbus auf Zuruf: Die ÖBB testen Verkehrsinnovation in Kärnten”: https://www.derbrutkasten.com/postbus-shuttle-oebb/
- DerBrutkasten, Interview “Das Intrapreneurship Programm der ÖBB“: https://www.derbrutkasten.com/das-intrapreneurship-programm-der-oebb/
- ÖBB Mobile Ticketing Webpage: https://www.oebb.at/de/tickets-kundenkarten/online-mobile-ticketing/oebb-app.html/
- DerStandard, Article “ÖBB tüfteln an neuem Smart-Ticketing“: https://www.derstandard.at/story/2000109130623/oebb-tuefteln-an-neuem-smart-ticketing-akku-zuege-auf-probefahrt/
- Futurezone, Article “ÖBB planen Einführung von GPS-Tickets“: https://futurezone.at/apps/oebb-planen-einfuehrung-von-gps-tickets/400650893/
