Transport solutions provider Vix Technology's vision goes beyond moving people from points A to B. It is about transforming people's everyday lives through seamless communication and efficient transport. "Transforming means making public transport easier and more efficient, helping commuters get where they need to, when they need to and however they need to," says Vix CEO Steve Gallagher. Designing, supplying and operating automated fare-collection (AFC) systems for the transit industry, Vix delivers a comprehensive line of turnkey solutions. This ranges from smartcards to ticket processors, card processors and readers, platform and ticket validators, vending machines and bus computers. Supporting public and private transport operators from concept to maintenance, the company also delivers design and engineering, platform and application development, product lifecycle management and manufacturing management services. Vix has developed some of the world's most sophisticated mobility solutions over the past 25 years. It has deployed about 200,000 custom electronic devices across six continents and has more than 80 million smartcards in circulation, used in 1.8 billion financial transactions annually. Among the company's biggest projects is the development of the Octopus system in Hong Kong in 1997, which was the world's first integrated smartcard ticketing system. It also built and operates Beijing's largest transport clearing house for Metro Lines and rolled out the original EZ-Link smartcard system in Singapore. Continuously investing in research and development, Vix acquired Australian Securities Exchange-listed technology company ERG in 2009. Aiming to deliver enhanced offerings through highly integrated, efficient and cost-effective solutions, it also acquired intelligent transportation systems (ITS) and real-time passenger information (RPI) specialist ACIS in 2010. Vix Technology, Vix ERG and Vix ACIS were integrated under the single brand Vix in October last year. The integration makes up the company's transit and mobility business unit encompassing AFC, transit clearing house, ITS and RPI. Vix complements its core competency in mobility solutions through other business areas that focus on product engineering, payments and telecommunications. "We are now building a complete offering and service capability by acquiring targeted entities to continue going beyond fare collection," Gallagher says. "We are leveraging this synergy among our business units to provide completely integrated services for mobility and connectivity." With in-house mechanical, electronic, software and component engineers, industrial designers, drafts people and manufacturing specialists, Vix develops reliable, feature-rich and cost-effective products tailored to customers' specifications. It also partners with contract manufacturers such as Hong Kong-listed Suga, which manufactures products in Shenzhen, to help Vix maintain competitiveness in the global market. Under its payments unit, Vix offers a wide range of point-of-sale (POS) devices for attended, unattended and mobile environments. These are built using the latest technology based on a single development platform. A key player in electronic payments in 35 countries since 1988 through subsidiary Intellect, Vix enables integrated services such as low-value retail payments. This has been exemplified in the company's successful rollout of the Octopus and EZ-Link smartcards that can be used not only for public transport but also other POS transactions. Completing Vix's pillars is its telecommunications segment, which offers voice and data services for household and business applications using internet protocol telephony, mobile voice and data, digital subscriber line, fibre and wireless data technologies. "Vix's edge over competitors is its depth of application expertise, the credibility to act as our customers' consultant to help them understand what they need," Gallagher says. "We also have the flexibility to work with various partners, set up localised operations and source locally - and still provide the advantages of an international company that has the experience of working around the world." The company's aggressive development strategy is fuelled by a growing market, particularly in the Asia-Pacific, where rapid urbanisation is prompting government and private transport operators to seek efficient solutions. Taking its successful experience in Hong Kong, Beijing and Singapore, Vix eyes more projects on the mainland and other emerging markets, including Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines, where it works with engineering partner Singapore Technologies. "Asia is our highest-growing region and will be the biggest part of our future," Gallagher says. "We are looking for a balanced win-win partnership approach with customers to help them deliver their business goals, bring people to use public transport and make it easy and safe to use and convenient to pay for."
