This section includes the outcome of the planned market analysis for the positions of SMASH in the field of Smart Mobility and Usage Based Insurance, the progress with the customer engagement, the elaboration of the key technical characteristics, the IPR strategy, the description of the partnerships established, and the main achievements.
In the feasibility period, from May to September 2015, Greenspider developed several relations with prospect customers representing the different segments addressed by SMASH proposition, and several expression of interest for SMAH arrived from several companies in Europe and outside. Some expression of interest were collected thanks to the promotion of Greenspider in international business networks, like EEN (European Enterprise Network). Other relations were established approaching directly the customer.
Greenspider established direct business relation with vehicle manufacturers, distributor of electric cars and electric bikes, willing to adopt the product SMASH to facilitate their rental service.
The vehicle sharing schemes are in general in expanding phase, and after the successful example of car sharing, now it’s the momentum for the explosion of schemes of smaller vehicles, often deployed in “free floating” scheme. The small vehicles, both electric or with thermic motorization, are the preferred target for SMASH installation. A concrete interest for SMASH comes from the segment of the scooter-sharing. The scooter-sharing operator SCOOME, with fleets in Monaco and Koln, in rapid expansion in Germany, formalized the interest for a pilot project, finalized to the adoption of the system.
The winning requirements of SMASH in this segment are the reduced footprint and absorption compared to similar devices for cars, and the possibility to plugin additional sensor.
The german eMobility operator Wunjoo and eGap are interested to support field trials in Munich, Starnberg and Garmisch. In this case the system SMASH provides access to a fleet of eBike in sharing scheme, that are parked in boxes accessible only by registered users that can access in mobile mode. The mobile authentication supported by SMASH is considered a key success factor.
The engagement of customers also includes Car Rental companies, corporate car sharing. For railcar operators the low power absorption of SMASH is a key characteristic.
Another category of customers that Greenspider is engaging is represented by the Charging Point Operators for eMobility, and Charging Station manufacturers. It is recognized that, embedding SMASH in the charging point, they will support self-positioning capability and proximity interaction that may transform a simple station in a smart, active point of interest.
The market analysis focused also on Usage Based Insurance, and permitted to collect the preferred requirements coming from this market segment. The company UNIPOL declares in its Expression of Interest, not only that the device can enable new insurance models, “but may also introduce flexibility and efficiency in already existing insurance options for end user”
The adoption of the embedded SIM in the SMASH Device is confirmed to be an important feature for the competiveness of the product, and guarantee the possibility to deploy the product everywhere in the world, with Over-the-air configuration. The Italian brand Piaggio declares its interest embed in their eBike the solution with the characteristics of SMASH, with special attention for the SIM over-the-air, which permits to produce a “Connected eBike” with full interoperability.
For the development of the web services and the applet to be distributed Greenspider finalized partnerships with companies specialized in cloud services for fleet management, willing to integrate SMASH in their cloud.
The commercial offer includes a fixed initial Price (covering the unitary production cost of the device), and the monthly fee per unit applied to the end-user, generating a revenue sharing model with the mobile operator providing the connectivity. The initial pricing activates also the “try and buy” service. Thanks to this option, the customer can benefit of a limited amount of position updates, user authentication, and control commands, so that can verify that the service suits its need, and which is the best Service profile to buy.
From the point of view of the competition, the market of advanced fleet management is characterized by two types of solutions; the solutions based on on-Board devices, and the solutions based on end-user Smartphone. Both types are in a rapid growth trend. SMASH Device, being an Advanced Fleet Management device with interactive data sharing between on-board device and user smartphone, combines the characteristics of both type of solutions.
The feasibility study confirmed the big limitation due to the fact that in most case the services are not interoperable. The aim of Greenspider, as well as its distinctive characteristics, is to enable with SMASH device interoperable Service for Smart Mobility, aiming to establish as global leader in the field.
For the protection of SMASH concept, the IPR process of SMASH solution started with an EU patent application filed on the 5th of December 2014 (EP14 196 604.4). During the feasibility the EESR (Extended European Search Report) has been received from European Patent office. The company now proceeding with a filing of the answer, and an extension of the geographic coverage of the Patent application.
