Trevo, an app-based people-to-people (P2P) car sharing marketplace, is embracing the National Transport Policy 2019-2030’s vision to involve public participation and stakeholder engagement in the development of transport initiatives, and to embed robust evidence-based assessment in the planning and development of transportation.
Trevo is the first company to embrace the Ministry of Transport’s call for mobility service providers to submit Proof of Concept (POC) research, and has kicked off a multi-phase year-long POC exercise running from August 2020 to August 2021, which seeks to demonstrate the sustainability of P2P car sharing in Malaysia and strengthen its viability.
The POC aims to identify areas for improvement, including challenges and gaps in the system that may be revealed as the car sharing community grows, such as insurance coverage needs and other safety and security measures, regulatory and licensing frameworks, and areas of possible ambiguity, with the ultimate aim of empowering a safe and efficient car sharing marketplace.
“In any economy, it is important to continuously innovate new ways to generate revenue and create more value in asset ownership. This is especially true in today’s economic climate, with the latest unemployment rate at 4.9% and approximately 773,200 people out of work, not forgetting those hit by reduced working hours and pay cuts. More Malaysians can certainly benefit from optimising their cars to generate income, which can cover auto loans and maintenance costs. Those working from home can also list idle vehicles to generate supplemental income,” said Leon Foong, chief executive officer of SOCAR Mobility Malaysia.
“Through our POC exercise, we will be able to gather concrete proof to support the value of P2P car sharing, which will further strengthen this mobility model. We are committed to partnering the government in developing a more inclusive and accessible model of transportation asset ownership in Malaysia, where an asset’s innate value can be shared among users while generating new forms of value, underpinned by our innovative P2P car sharing model. The pandemic may have compelled us to tweak our business timelines, but we are more confident than ever that the transportation model we are offering will resonate strongly among Malaysians,” Leon added.
Commenting on TREVO’s POC exercise, Minister of Transport, Wee Ka Siong said, “Gone are the days of rigid top-down planning by bureaucrats. Instead, we are embracing dynamic ideas from private businesses who closely track the shifts in industry trends and consumer demand – with the mutual goal of driving innovation and progress in the mobility landscape. The sharing economy holds great promise for Malaysians, improving resilience in a challenging economic climate. We look forward to the findings from Trevo’s Proof of Concept exercise, and urge other private businesses wishing to introduce new concepts in transportation to submit relevant POC business proposals to the Ministry of Transport,” he said.
Trevo’s proof of concept exercise will be executed in stages, whereby upcoming stages will see the introduction of collaborations with partners in the airline, banking, fintech and automotive industries, which are currently in development.
