Nokia study on the increased efficiency of car pooling one can achieve thanks to mobile phones

Added weight = slower car = Stefan is not happy. Not happy at all.

Putting People First:

Nokia (NYSE: NOK) Research has published a short paper by Stephan Hartwig and Michael Buchmann
on how mobile communication services can become a next generation
ride-sharing tool, with a potential to mitigate traffic- and emission
problems in the 21st century.

There are 500+ million privately owned passenger cars
worldwide, thereof 236 million in the US. These cars travel in the
magnitude of 5 trillion km per year. Let’s assume 2 empty seats per car
and a small hypothetical value of only 5 cent per km and per seat, the
potential value of empty travelling seats amounts to 500 billion €.

The memo points out that current low popularity of car
pooling results from technical constraints rather than lack of
attractiveness of ride-sharing as such, and explores how mobile
communication services can cross-link supply and demand of these empty
seats.

Download paper (pdf, 363 kb, 11 pages)