Chris Johns, PassageWay
The 16:9 PODCAST IS SPONSORED BY SCREENFEED – DIGITAL SIGNAGE CONTENT The UK startup PassageWay operates with the interesting mission of using technology that nudges people to make well-informed and more sustainable decisions about how they get from A to B. That's done by thinking through and developing the presentation layer for Real-Time Passenger Information content that's then run on digital signs, most notably for the bus systems around the city of London. PassageWay's business model is - in simple terms - taking the rich, real-time data available for routes and stops and making it presentable and digestible for transport authorities, like Transport For London, which pays the start-up to do so. The logical notion is that the more that good, real-time information is made available to people, the more the transport services will be used. While London Underground stations are well-equipped with information and the services are pretty predictable, there's not as much available to the millions who use less-predictable surface transport services like the iconic double-decker red buses. I had a good chat about all this recently with PassageWay co-founder Chris Johns. Subscribe from wherever you pick up new podcasts. TRANSCRIPT Chris, thank you for joining me. Can you tell me what PassageWay is all about? Chris Johns: Thanks so much for inviting us to your podcast today. PassageWay is all about generating demand for public transport by leveraging real-time information. We do this by putting it onto digital signs that are displayed on host-supplied screens and typically these screens only require a modern browser to display the digital sign. You made a point of saying the host supplied. There's been a history through the years of companies who've done things like put in the infrastructure, the screens, and so on and then run content on them with the idea that content would be Interrupted so to speak by advertising. You're not going down that path. Chris Johns: No, we're not. Typically those sorts of plays are similar to JC Decaux or Clear Channel who have long had this relationship with transport authorities whereby they will fund the deployment of bus shelters in return for an ad revenue share. We supply transport for London with digital signs that are displayed at bus shelters but also within their other infrastructure like bus stations. But really we're more citywide about putting digital signs into places such as schools, hospitals, workplaces, offices, and such in order to generate demand from the sort of non-traditional locations and encouraging the people within those locations to consider public transport. So this doesn't sound like a traditional business, you said, this is about generating demand to use public transport services and so on versus, more traditionally, this is about making money somehow or other. Chris Johns: Yeah. I think that's the difference, a lot of those traditional plays actually put the real-time information secondary to their primary objective which is to earn revenue from the display of ads. And to my mind, that means a poor customer experience and the poor customer experience means reduced demand. If you think about traditional bus shelters, they are actually incredibly complex for many people trying to navigate the public transport information. If you're coming to London, for example, trying to find out which is the right bus? Is it going to go to your preferred stop? How long is it going to take? Is there any disruption information? If you don't have it, it will make you want to go and choose a different mode of transport. So, you probably take a taxi or you may end up using your own car, for example. Actually what we're trying to do is to show people that public transport is really easy to use. It's really accessible. It can get you from A to B pretty fast. And if you're aware of the onward travel information from the stop you're trying to get to, then actually, you can make the