SopranoParking

2002 Consensus Software Awards

Brief product description

SOPRANO Parking allows people to use a mobile phone, or other mobile device to buy parking minutes on meters. Using their mobile phone’s SMS messaging functionality the user enters an identification code for the relevant meter and nominates the amount of time they want to buy. SOPRANO Parking debits that user’s micro-payment wallet and instructs the meter to register the amount of time available. The micro-payment wallet is a virtual wallet that accumulates small value transactions. Settlement can be pre or post paid.  Where Parking charges are post-paid amounts accumulated in the wallet are periodically charged to the user’s bank account or added to their telephone account. When charges are prepaid the user periodically tops up the wallet by transferring funds from their bank account. SOPRANO Parking also enables parking inspectors to book offenders in real-time. After selecting an expired spot the inspector is prompted to enter the car’s registration number. Other infringement details such as the location and the time of the day are already known by the system. SOPRANO Parking communicates directly with the back office system, which takes care of the processing of the infringements. The inspector can print an infringement ticket, which is left behind to notify the driver. SOPRANO Parking can be deployed independently of physical meters or completely without them. In case of a deployment without meter integration, inspection of proper payment is performed via a wireless application. When the inspector selects a parking zone, a list of the expired parking spots in that zone is displayed.

Innovation

Breaking New Ground

SOPRANO parking is unique because it integrates all aspect of parking payment and administration into one system. It can be used without the physical presence of a parking meter or can be used in conjunction with any existing parking meter. Because a payment wallet is integrated into the solution, bank fees do not accumulate on every small transaction. It is one of the first wireless applications to make micro-payment an economically viable solution.

Alternative parking payment systems are hardware dependent because they use a swiped card process. IE users buy a prepaid card and swipe it on the meter. While avoiding the need for small change these models do not do anything to overcome most of the cost and efficiency issues facing operators of fixed parking meters.

SOPRANO Parking can be implemented with and without integration with physical parking meters. Thus SOPRANO Parking offers meter operators the opportunity to evolve to a centralised, no coins parking operation without the necessity of replacing existing meters.

Social Change and Empowerment of Users

SOPRANO Parking empowers users. They no longer need to carry small change, receive warnings if meter is about to expire, and can top up the meter without returning to the vehicle.

The fact that SOPRANO Parking can be implemented without the physical presence of a parking meter means that in the future it will not be necessary to clutter our metropolitan areas with unsightly Meters.

Performance

General

SOPRANO Parking is a carrier grade solution that supports high volume transaction processing and almost 100% availability. SOPRANO Parking’s reliability and ability to process up to 5,000 messages per second sets a new industry benchmark. Without these performance characteristics the ASP business model necessary to make wireless parking commercially viable would not be possible.

All SOPRANO applications are integrated with the SOPRANO Enterprise Platform that provides development frameworks to access the user, customer, service, account and terminal profiles.

SOPRANO Enterprise currently runs Telstra’s Pocket News applications, its capacity and performance is well proven.  The success of Pocket news is testament to the performance of the SOPRANO product range. Internal testing has proven that the integrated SOPRANO Enterprise and SOPRANO parking applications are capable of handling the required huge volume of transactions with extreme accuracy and consistency.

Real User Benefits

• SOPRANO offers councils significant reductions in administration costs, increased revenue through greater compliance and reduced operating costs. For example: Currently only 50% of people parking fully comply with parking restriction. Any time when a space is occupied but not paid reduces council revenue. SOPRANO’s Parking’s convenience and ability to top up will increase payment compliance.

• Meters are often unavailable when coin storage is full. SOPRANO parking reduces coin usage and minimises meter unavailability.

• SOPRANO Parking allows inspectors to check for expired meters using their mobile phone without having to physically inspect each meter. This increases their efficiency and reduces operating costs.

• Real time booking of offenders allows inspectors to produce an infringement notice and update police databases at the same time.

• Banks currently charge between 15 cents and one dollar to process electronic transactions. This makes direct processing of many small payments uneconomic. By accumulating charges in the micro-payment wallet SOPRANO Parking significantly reduces the cost of processing transactions and makes small value electronic payments a reality.

Potential

Enthusiastic Customer Support

SOPRANO Parking is a new commercial application of wireless technology. Although it has not been commercially implemented at this stage many councils in Australia have expressed significant interest which demonstrates SOPRANO Parking’s huge potential. The extent of this customer interest and support is best evidenced by the fact that Leichardt council and Wilson Parking have agreed to take part in the first commercial pilot.  Early in 2002 SOPRANO Parking will be implemented on one street in the Leichardt council precinct.

Potential Markets

A Potential market exists for SOPRANO Parking anywhere in the world where there are 150,000 parking meters or more.

Our financial projections are based on adoption of a centralised ASP model servicing a 50,000 meter market and securing a 30% market share in each market.  This is equivalent to one ASP servicing the Australian market.

SOPRANO’s scalability and flexibility make it possible to service the entire Australian market from one central location.   The basic ASP model can be rolled out worldwide and is likely to be more profitable in larger European and US markets where greater economies of scale can be achieved.

Key assumptions are:

Other information the judges should know

ABOUT SOPRANO

SOPRANO’s mission is to deliver a richer, newer experience to wireless end users.

We will provide our customers with innovative, personalised and simple to navigate products that make their lives easier and more enjoyable.  “Ericsson are always looking to provide the best technical solutions. The flexibility of the Soprano solution allows us to work across different platforms and complement our GSM, WAP, GPRS and third generation mobility systems” Mr Daryl Joyce, Ericsson Director of Business Development Quote 2: “As Australia’s largest telecommunications carrier, Telstra maintains its leadership position through the development of new products and services that utilise the latest in cutting-edge technology. The partnership with Soprano will assist Telstra in further reinforcing its leadership status in the Australian telecommunications market” Mr Rick Wakeham, Managing Director, Products, Telstra On-Air Wireless solutions for a rapidly changing world.

Since 1994 Soprano has been at the forefront of a rapidly changing telecommunications sector, developing innovative software technology solutions for wireless and the Internet. Our strengths lie in our ability to rapidly deploy increasingly sophisticated software solutions, and our depth of experience delivering these solutions to our growing customer base all over the world. Meeting and exceeding their expectations as we go.

Not surprisingly, with the advent of e-commerce – one of the most exciting wireless applications - Soprano is again on the crest of the wave. Working with banking and finance sectors, telecommunications carriers and service providers, delivering software solutions that will drive the revolution to even greater heights, using mobile phones and devices.

Proven and innovative

Soprano’s proven wireless solutions deliver the must have information your customer wants.  News, stock market reports, mobile banking and e-commerce, ticketing, shopping and more … to any mobile device, anywhere they are, and at anytime of the day or night.

Our innovative technology enable your customers to easily access personalised and location sensitive information, through a vast range of mobile devices including WAP, SMS, SIMToolkit, PDA, e-mail, I-mode IVR and web-based terminals.

Experienced and highly focussed

A fast moving, experienced and highly focussed company, Soprano can quickly implement innovative wireless solutions that will keep you ahead of the competition. Solutions with advanced features like:

• customer profiling

• sophisticated billing

• secure financial transactions

• device independent delivery

• content management

• location sensitivity

• load-balancing, fault resilience

• fault-resilience

• scalability

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