Red Funnel ferries, operating on the South Coast, are now using Twitter to keep travellers and road transport operators informed of their timing and whereabouts. IBM worked with Red Funnel ferries to deploy the use of the social networking platform. The information posted through Twitter now makes the transport link more predictable. By avoiding unforeseen delays at the ferry port, many of the island’s trade and goods operators have the opportunity for greater business efficiency.

Using on board sensors on the ferries and applying data analytics, the imminent arrival or departure of all ferries is able to be sent to customers via Twitter, retrieved as an RSS feed onto a mobile phone, or computer, or made visible in real-time on the ferry operators’ web site.

Jonathan Green, Sales & Marketing Director at Red Funnel commented: “What is remarkable is that by applying intelligence to information we already generated, IBM is helping us provide a smart service for a minimal investment.” He further explained; “With nearly 14,000 vehicle ferry sailings and 23,000 Red Jet passenger sailings each year, improving the information flow to help our customers better plan their journeys and avoid unnecessary delays is of tremendous value. In the future we expect to be able to further develop the system to provide real-time information on how the service is operating against the schedule, and also be able to SMS customers booked on the service to advise of any delay.”