Berlin’s coolest car share operator has a new trick
Berlin car share innovator MILES Mobility turns to Ubiq for AI-driven fleet management services
BERLIN: Germany’s capital is a bustling city. Its modernist architecture towering over an incessant flow of people; a city revelling in its moment as a cultural hub and a melting pot of social innovations.
Full of young urbanites more interested in exploring than possessing, car sharing in the city is booming. Luckily for Berliners, they have in MILES Mobility a car share operator well-equipped to accompany them in their urban discovery.
Founded in 2016, MILES provides extensive car sharing coverage in a number of German cities. With a unique mix of cars and a pricing structure that charges only the kilometers driven - not the time spent in traffic - MILES delivers an affordable, stress-free urban transport solution. And with their stylish fleet of jet black cars, they also look pretty slick.
Now with the help of Ubiq’s AI-driven fleet-rebalancing service, MILES can more effectively match demand with supply.
West - east, cold zones - hot zones
One of the major challenges to running a car share service is maintaining a high vehicle utilization rate. This essentially comes down to understanding the real demand for cars at a specific time and positioning the vehicles where they are most likely to be used.
To get more out of its existing fleet in Berlin, MILES has deployed Ubiq’s StreetCrowd service - a decentralized fleet operations ecosystem powered by artificial intelligence (AI) and executed by ordinary members of the public.
To make this possible, Ubiq provides MILES with a 24/7 prediction model functioning on a block-by-block basis. This includes saturation caps whereby zones are switched off automatically when enough vehicles are there to meet projected demand, preventing oversupply.
However, while this intelligence is useful, in itself it doesn’t lead to more rides. You need to move the vehicles first. This is where the StreetCrowd comes in.
Citizen-executed operations
The StreetCrowd is a decentralized operations community made up of members of the public, recruited and paid by Ubiq. With nearly 300 StreetCrowd users in Berlin (and growing), MILES can tap into a flexible workforce, spread out across the city, allowing for a decentralized operational ecosystem.
Conveniently for MILES, Ubiq takes care of everything including: establishing the StreetCrowd community, distributing tasks, steering the workforce and carrying out payments. Unlike in many other cities, where StreetCrowd users are paid a flat fee for moving vehicles, in Berlin it is based on distance. This encourages vehicle repositioning over longer distances, reflecting the unique customer demand in the city, concentrated in particular areas.
Moderat movements, large benefits
With intelligent fleet rebalancing, MILES is able to get more out of its existing fleet by increasing the amount of time each vehicle is being rented - rather than sitting idly by the curbside. As each move results in additional rental trips, once applied to its fleet of over 1000, MILES is able to achieve significantly more trips each day. And with more vehicles available, their service becomes more convenient for users, too.
In the scrappy world of shared mobility where independent players like MILES compete alongside huge corporates, getting ahead takes skill. In combining MILES’ customer-centric service with Ubiq’s AI-driven fleet rebalancing tools, the citizens of Berlin benefit from a service that is always there when they need it. With Ubiq and MILES, the future of Berlin’s urban transport is on-demand.
MILES Mobility is active in the German cities of Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne, Dusseldorf and Munich.
If you are interested in finding out more about fleet rebalancing and optimizing operational efficiency, get in touch with us at hi@ubiq.ai
Emily Kellert is Project Manager at Ubiq, responsible for steering the execution of Ubiq's services. Connect with her on LinkedIn to learn more about what she does.