Journey sharing app Jaunt was announced as the winner of the Ford Smart Mobility Game Challenge at Mobile World Congress, in Barcelona today.
Developed by Ilya Zarembsky and Betsy Medvedovsky, in New York, Jaunt enables users to both create journeys and join those created by others for fastest journeys or more scenic routes. The creators were awarded €10,000 for their app.
Jaunt offers an interactive map that enables users to filter available “jaunts” by transport mode, location and time, and discover more about their fellow travellers. Sharing trips, the use of different traffic modes, and motivating travellers to use alternative routes will help to ease the pressure on main traffic routes and improve the flow of traffic in city areas.
“Game developers have an impressive track record in taking new ways of looking at real-world problems and coming up with fresh solutions, and that is exactly what we wanted to tap into for the Ford Smart Mobility Game Challenge,” said Ken Washington, vice president, Ford Research and Advanced Engineering. “Jaunt is the perfect example of just such a disruptive approach. Avoiding busy routes by connecting travellers to share trips could help to reduce congestion through ride sharing, and makes lives better by helping people to enjoy journeys more – whether travelling by car, bicycle, public transport, or on foot.”
SelfieGo, an app designed to make journeys by bicycle and on foot more appealing, placed runner-up and Flux, an app designed to alleviate congestion through the gamification of traffic jams, came third. Both were awarded €7,500 prize money.
Developed with Cologne Game Lab and launched last year at Gamescom, the largest interactive games trade fair in Europe, the Ford Smart Mobility Game Challenge invited developers to create game concepts that could solve real-life problems in urban mobility.
Take a look at Jaunt by watching the video below:
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