Journeo, a provider of IT services to the transportation industry, has signed a new framework agreement with First Bus UK, based on its SaaS platform and is expected to generate £9m in revenue.
The contract, which is the group’s largest to date and will initially last for three years until March 2025 with the option to extend for another 2 years until March 2027.
For the tracking, video management, and remote condition monitoring of on-vehicle devices, First Bus completed an extensive and successful trial of Journeo’s IoT EDGE car gateway and cloud SaaS portal.
Work on the rollout of the other 3,300 vehicles in their fleet, in addition to the 1,200 that are currently connected, will begin immediately.
Since 2010, Journeo has provided safety and security solutions to First Bus, and under the terms of the agreement, the company will continue to provide the ‘latest high-performance CCTV and safety-critical digital wing mirror systems’, as well as technical design, new technology assessment, and project management services backed up by nationwide technical support.
The total number of vehicles connected and using Journeo’s SaaS platform will exceed 13,000 once the rollout phase is concluded.
The agreement’s contracted revenues were factored into management’s performance expectations for the current fiscal year along with adding to the company’s order book, increasing future revenue visibility.
With a fleet of roughly 5,000 buses, First Bus is the second-largest regional bus operator in the UK, operating around a fifth of local bus services in the deregulated market outside of London.
Despite Covid-19, they carried 465,000 passengers each day in 2020-21, serving 40 of the UK’s main towns and cities, including two-thirds of the country’s 15 largest metropolitan areas.
They have purchased around 2,000 new buses since 2010, which has boosted punctuality, fuel and cost efficiency, and lowered its environmental impact.
First Bus has committed to operating a zero-emission bus fleet by 2035 as a forerunner in the decarbonization future for public transportation and has no plans to purchase any new diesel buses beyond December 2022.
The business currently comprises two divisions, fleet operator solutions and passenger transport infrastructure solutions
Journeo
Journeo collaborates widely with local authorities and global transportation companies, assisting them as their systems converge toward a greener future for smarter cities.
Journeo offers flexible, scalable solutions and services that can interact with existing technology while preparing for future developments thanks to an IoT strategy and open standards, as well as field-proven and reliable engineering.
Using local Wi-Fi or the 4G capacity of the EDGE vehicle gateway, Journeo’s cloud-based SaaS solution gives authorised users verified, high-security access to video and relevant data from any connected car.
Journeo’s machine learning software delivers important in-service performance data for ‘predictive maintenance’ plans, as well as the transfer of vital information in real-time from the vehicle to back-office business systems, making it a secure foundation for linking other vehicle services.
The company has invested over £5 million in R&D over the past four years, allowing it to build and deliver new solutions for the customers’ demands and the challenges of modern public transport.
“We are delighted that First Bus have selected Journeo’s cloud-based video management solution for their entire UK bus fleet. We designed our SaaS solution specifically for the transport sector where secure and scalable communications and open-architecture standards offer a clear path for operators and authorities to connect assets using a range of IoT gateways and sensors to benefit from the data insights that it provides,” commented Russ Singleton, CEO of Journeo.
Journeo shares soared 34% to 142p following the news of its new agreement with First Bus UK on Friday afternoon trade.