HHLA promotes the intelligent mobility of its employees

In times when city centres are congested and motorways overloaded, there is a need for new, innovative ideas that enable people to get from point A to point B quickly and in an environmentally friendly way. “rethink mobility”, the digital platform developed by 25ways, provides up to 25 possible transport combinations for commutes and business trips. Since previous services separated their display of a journey’s course according to the means of transport – for instance, only car or bicycle – this represents a new approach.

25ways’ solution not only calculates the time required for various combinations, but also determines the reduction in cost and in CO₂ when a traveller chooses alternatives to a car. Additionally, the platform bundles together all the mobility options that a company offers its employees. For instance, pilot customer HHLA offers its own e-bike programme, subscription tickets for local public transport, and electric cars and bicycles for business trips.

25ways is a start-up that was established in January 2017 in Hamburg’s Speicherstadt historical warehouse district. Over the past six months, it has been supported by the Next Logistics Accelerator (NLA), also located in the Speicherstadt. HHLA has been an investor in the NLA since its inception in spring 2018. On Wednesday, 24 October, the first four start-ups that were supported by the accelerator were introduced, including 25ways. With the NLA’s support, the “rethink mobility” platform has been brought to market maturity.

HHLA will be the first customer to use the platform. Arno Schirmacher, Director of HR Management at HHLA, and Henrik Zölzer, Managing Director of 25ways, signed a cooperation agreement. For the first time, this makes HHLA the customer of a project that was developed by one of the accelerators it supports.

Arno Schirmacher, Director of HR Management at HHLA, explains, “HHLA is involving our employees in the implementation of our digital strategy. The digital solution developed by 25ways offers real value to HHLA employees as they seek to move through the city faster and in an environmentally friendly way. In addition, intelligent mobility concepts provide an important competitive advantage for companies and their environments. We want to link up with further companies in Hamburg so that together we can offer our employees further mobility options on this joint platform.”

Henrik Zölzer, founder and Managing Director of 25ways GmbH, emphasises how valuable the NLA’s support was for the project – not only financially, but also because of the close contact with important Hamburg companies like HHLA. “HHLA was very open to our digital solution from the beginning. We were impressed that we were able to sign a contract so quickly, and that HHLA is now our first customer. We are especially glad that HHLA wants to promote the topic of mobility in the port and in Hamburg, in collaboration with other employers. Collectively, we see a great number of opportunities for new approaches.”

A suggestion by 25ways provides an example of the advantages of the digital solution: if an employee or a job applicant wants to get from a flat on Marktstraße in Hamburg’s Karolinenviertel Quarter to the HHLA Container Terminal Altenwerder (CTA), the trip by bus and train currently takes between 75 and 120 minutes, depending on traffic. 25ways recommends a combination of cycling and taking a ferry. This would only take 48 minutes. Over an entire year, this is calculated to save approximately 120 hours in travel time compared to travelling by bus and train. Compared with a car, the bicycle-ferry combination saves operating costs of € 630 and leads to a reduction of more than 830 kilos in CO₂ emissions.

25ways introduced its mobility platform to an international expert audience in Copenhagen in September at the “Intelligent Transport Systems” (ITS) World Congress. The Congress, the largest industry event in the area of intelligent transport systems in the world, takes place on an alternating basis in America, Asia and Europe. In October 2021, Hamburg will be the next European host. HHLA will take part in the ITS World Congress with its own projects.