Fleet management solution wins Gauteng transportation challenge

A group known as GAP Optimax has won a challenge to develop a solution for the transportation issues Gauteng citizens face every day.

The Hollard Hack the Gap challenge was contested by three teams comprising of work-seeking graduates‚ Gordon Institute of Business (GIBS) MBA students‚ representatives from the Gauteng government and Hollard.

The groups met on Saturday morning and were given 24 hours to present their solution to a panel of three judges on Sunday morning.

The winning group proposed a fleet management solution to ensure the optimisation of the existing assets.

“The real problem centred on is the optimisation of the existing assets. If there are moments when a bus runs empty‚ that means there should be a time when we can make sure that it doesn’t.

“Or it’s a question of saying should we be using the bus during that particular time when it is running empty or should be pursuing something else that can do the same service‚” the group said.

Another group known as The Blue Light Gang proposed an innovative‚ easy to use transport app to improve the future of Gauteng’s transport system.

It called its system the Gauteng Transport Integrator‚ which is reliant on an app.

“At core to the success of the company is a seamless‚ cashless system that enables government to pass on any available subsidies to the commuter using existing platforms such as bank cards‚ Sassa cards‚ students cards and pensioner’s cards and it must be agile and responsive to the market‚” the group said.

The third group‚ known as Team Regulator‚ proposed the formalisation of the taxi industry‚ which transported the majority of public transport users‚ and ensuring that all drivers were registered.

One of the judges‚ faculty member of GIBS Marius Oosthuizen‚ said there was some convergence between the groups.

“All the groups felt there is something that is needed in the transport sector that is about professionalisation and regulation and incentives and subdisidisation.”

He said some of the groups took a divergent approach as one went much more over to the institutional side on what government could do with the other partners.

“There was a quiet level of convergence about the use of technology to solve some of the challenges through apps etc. But all the groups agreed that this is not something that any one actor can do alone. It is not something government can do without business and industry.”

Oosthuizen said what could be taken from the presentations was that collaboration was needed for these solutions.

Another judge‚ Hollard chief marketing officer Heidi Brauer‚ said there was nothing the country needed more than to talk to each other and to think together.

“We have to figure how we take these ideas now and hopefully give them some life‚” Brauer said.

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