TfL collaboration framework offers new ways to work with the innovation marketplace

Transport for London (TfL) has announced that Mercedes-Benz and French digital services company Sopra Steria have been appointed as partners on its new Innovation Collaboration Framework (ICF).

The framework, says TfL, was developed as the result of listening to innovators to help find a new way of working together that is beneficial to both TfL and the partners, and then in turn to those living and working in London. It will also, says TfL “provide a new, simplified route to bring in investment, new ideas and scale them to benefit TfL and Londoners.”

The four-year framework will look to directly address key transport challenges such as achieving sustainability, making public transport safer and helping services become more efficient and reliable.

Through the framework, TfL and the innovation partners will work together to create new concepts and products to help improve how people move around and to make the city a better place to live. By creating this framework, TfL says it can build long-term mutually beneficial partnerships with these companies and tap into valuable research and development investment, in return for access to TfL's support to create solutions.

Unlike conventional procurement, the ICF allows TfL and the selected innovators to work on the most challenging problems as they emerge, taking a solution from concept to scale.

It will also enable these partners to test new products on the TfL network, allowing solutions to be assessed in a real-world environment and create opportunities to scale products in the future. London is a great proving ground for new innovations and showing they can work here will also demonstrate how they could work in other cities.

The two partners will also be able to reach out to other innovators including start-ups, academics, and small/medium enterprises to harness their ideas and expertise. By creating this framework, the time it takes to develop solutions should be reduced as partners can help identify appropriate innovators to address problems as they arise.

The ICF does not involve any cost to the taxpayer until the solutions are developed and creates potential from TfL to earn revenue from the innovations that result from it. Once successful products are developed and tested, the framework offers opportunities for TfL and relevant partners to commercialise them in overseas markets, helping to bring in additional revenue that can be invested into the TfL network.

Thomas Ableman, Director of Strategy and Innovation at TfL, said, "TfL has ambitious goals to make London a more sustainable city. Neither Londoners nor the climate crisis will wait, so we need to move faster than ever before. The Innovation Collaboration Framework is a completely new way for us to work with the innovation marketplace.”