Do integrated mobility services have a future? The neglected role of non-mobility service providers: Challenges, and opportunities to extract sustainable transport outcomes

For the last twenty years we have seen exponential growth in interest in developing ways in which we can offer to the market a unified multi-modal ecosystem that is so appealing that individuals would abandon their traditional ways of making travel choices. The new ways are guided by offers through a digital platform either through pay as you go or a subscription to a package that aligns with more sustainable travel behaviour activity. Branded as Mobility as a Service (MaaS), we have to date seen little success despite the continuing euphoria in many settings. This paper is the result of a significant amount of research and practice designed to find ways to give MaaS a chance in the market, reflecting on what we see as the key features of any future MaaS aspiration in respect of having a scalable impact on changing traveller behaviour that is aligned with sustainability goals and resulting in a viable business case with or without government subsidy. A particular focus is a recognition of the role that non-mobility service providers (NMSPs) can play in extending the stakeholder set that may well give MaaS a scalable future. Which we evidence from the findings of in-depth interviews with senior staff in a number of NMSP businesses. We also suggest that the generalisation away from multi-modality to multi-service supported by rewards and incentives that benefit non-transport providers, is likely to reveal a continuing role for uni-modal solutions that can also align well with a MaaS eco-system.