OSPT Announces First Public Release of CIPURSE for Public Transportation Ecosystem

CIPURSE: An Open Standard for Next-Generation Transit Fare Collection

OSPT Announces CIPURSE™ Now Available to the Public

CIPURSE is here, but what is it? The OSPT (Open Standard for Public Transport) Alliance, who has made the announcement, is an international group seeded by four technology firms with the goal to solidify a unified global standard for NFC transactions in the transportation industry. Think public transportation and transit systems that rely on speed and timeliness to operate. Now, the OSPT operates as an alliance organization, and thus accepts members to join them in the push to standardize technology that will reduce costs, provide more flexibility, and increase security measures. CIPURSE, OSPT’s first public release, has been championed as an open platform, or as they say “open security standard specification”. The advantage if CIPURSE being an open standard is that it is more conducive to the exchange of information between vendors and provides greater versatility for transport system operators, all resulting in lower costs. This means higher adoption rate, greater chance of vendor neutrality, and the opportunity for more advanced developments as the CIPURSE and the OSPT community matures. CIPURSE Version 1.0 is currently ready for reading and evaluation.

CIPURSE Standards

Part of the idea of an open standard is to release the transit operators from the burden of proprietary systems that are difficult, and often expensive, to upgrade and maintain (not to mention have installed and get working). This could help in the advancement of the technology application immensely and could spark the innovative fire that could propel NFC beyond transit. That said, public transportation is a smart spot to begin your empire, OPTS. After all, on-the-go and quick payments are already a necessity and any automation with record keeping is of paramount importance in that type of environment. We understand that CIPURSE is going to encourage the exchange of transactional data between a multitude of potential NFC-enabled devices and objects – from stickers, phone and cards to fobs – which will give us the opportunity of experiencing more frictionless NFC.

Does CIPURSE spell danger for the almighty NFC Forum?

We know of another alliance of sorts that is dedicated to developing and maintaining standards for NFC technology and its use within the market. NFC Forum, meet CIPURSE. So, does this mean that the NFC Forum should be taking note now that there is another standard-minded organization moving in the neighborhood? Well, probably yes but also no and here’s why – the OSPT and CIPURSE are currently strictly for the transportation industry only. Members can only become members of the alliance by being a transit agency, an industry association involved with transit, or a research facility with an interest in public transportation – oh, and handing over €5000 for license and SDK access, which constitutes a full membership. The OSPT has identified four main target markets for CIPURSE and CIPURSE -based products:

1. Transit Operators
2. Transit Consultants and Integrators
3. Government Agencies
4. Fare Collection Solution Providers

These groups have been invited to join on the OSPT fun in becoming a part of CIPURSE; well, and reduce costs, pump up security, offer quicker and more reliable methods of payment. Just because OSPT has focused on this specific sector of transit fare collection and public transportation doesn’t mean that the CIPURSE products and/or concepts cannot bleed through into other industries, as this could be a real possibility depending on the usability and success of CIPURSE among the transit operators and developers alike.