Singapore-based transport technology solutions provider MobilityX has raised an undisclosed Series A round led by Toyota Tsusho Corporation, the trading arm of Japanese conglomerate Toyota Group, it said in a press release today.
Launched in February 2018 with a seed investment from Singapore’s main public transport operator SMRT, MobilityX develops solutions that use technology to solve transport-related issues like route planning.
Its flagship project in the city-state is a collaboration among Nanyang Technological University, state-owned industrial real estate statutory board JTC Corporation, and SMRT, which uses a single app (pictured below, named Jalan-Jalan, Malay for ‘take a walk’) managing different modes of transport including shuttle buses, shared bikes, e-scooters and so on to show the various ways users can get to their destination.
For this, while commuters appear to be its main target audience for Jalan -Jalan, it is likely that companies, especially those with interest in transport-based operations like ride-hailing, for example, would stand to benefit from data collected.
With its “integrated mobility subscription service for consumers to access public transport and first-and-last-mile services” in a beta testing phase, it will use the latest funds to deploy the solutions in the city-state and the region.
In this case, ‘first-and-last-mile’ connections are in reference to the beginning or end of a trip made primarily by public transportation, like between home and the nearest train stop, or the bus station to their destination. Consumers can use bike-sharing services to bridge the gap between first-mile or last-mile connections.
It has signed a number of partnerships with big players in Singapore, including telco SingTel and real estate developer CapitaLand.
With SingTel, for instance, it will look at how data analytics can help to improve transport-facing solutions in Singapore, with the telco integrating its services with the startup’s solutions to provide MobilityX users with customer payment and other services through an option like carrier billing.
The startup has also inked a “Master Collaboration Agreement” with Toyota Tsusho to further collaborate on developing its technology and expanding the business regionally. Another company that has received funding from the Toyota-owned arm is Singapore-headquartered O2O giant Grab, which has its roots in ride-hailing.
Editor: Ben Jiang