Calypso Networks Association (CNA) and the OSPT Alliance Announce Collaboration

28 January 2020 – Calypso Networks Association (CNA) and OSPT Alliance today announce their collaboration to drive the adoption of open standards in transport ticketing. The end goal of the cooperation program is to achieve convergence between their respective open standards – CALYPSO® and CIPURSE™ – simplifying the choice and integration options for public transport operators (PTOs) while bringing time and cost efficiencies to the entire transport ticketing value chain.

Recognizing an increasingly aligned value set, agenda and objectives, the associations have joined forces to promote the widespread benefits open standards provide over proprietary solutions.

“Since our mission first began a decade ago, the market has evolved dramatically. For PTOs however, the challenges caused by the dominance of proprietary systems have only intensified,” comments Philippe Martineau, President of OSPT Alliance. “CNA shares our passion to achieve a more open, collaborative ecosystem. And, in an increasingly complex and crowded market, it’s more important than ever that we combine our efforts to deliver operators a clear, coherent message, reduce market fragmentation and provide an alternative to vendor lock-in.”

“Convergence between CALYPSO and CIPURSE makes perfect sense. By combining voices and minds, we can take open standards’ adoption to the next level in transport ticketing” adds Philippe Vappereau, Chairman of CNA. “Our common aim is to simplify for all ticketing players, whether users or suppliers, the market complexity that limits the development of open solutions in favor of proprietary ones. There’s a lot to be done, but we’re excited, optimistic and prepared for a busy few years ahead.”

The initial work of this collaboration is to analyze in detail the unique strengths of the two standards and, with backward compatibility in mind, define a roadmap that respects and supports existing solutions. As such, CNA and OSPT Alliance members can be reassured that any investment in the CALYPSO and CIPURSE Specifications will be protected.

To quickly bring the full benefits of the cooperation to all stakeholders, the associations are creating shared working groups, which will ensure the necessary specifications and tools to enable compatibility between CALYPSO and CIPURSE are delivered. Three working groups have been established: Governance (to optimize organizational setup), Marketing and Communications (to ensure a common promotion of the open standard concept), and Technical (to work on topics such as an SDK based on the existing Eclipse Keyple Open Source Software and a common Secure Access Module Specification).

Want to learn more about the collaboration? Philippe Martineau and Philippe Vappereau will be delivering a joint presentation at Transport Ticketing Global in London on Tuesday 28 January at 4.40pm, followed by a short press conference at the CNA booth (booth number E35) at 5pm.

For more information, please visit https://www.calypsonet-asso.org/ and www.osptalliance.org.