Start of a new cooperation network

Local pub­lic trans­port with bus­es and trains in Ger­many is an indis­pens­able part of our mobil­i­ty and every­day cul­ture. Espe­cial­ly in met­ro­pol­i­tan areas, but also in many medi­um-sized and small towns with suc­cess­ful urban bus sys­tems, it is an impor­tant eco­nom­ic and loca­tion fac­tor. Last but not least, resource-effi­cient local pub­lic trans­port, togeth­er with pedes­tri­an and bicy­cle traf­fic, is one of the main pil­lars, if not the main pil­lar, of the nec­es­sary and already ini­ti­at­ed traf­fic turn­around with a view to sus­tain­able mobil­i­ty and cli­mate pro­tec­tion goals. The attrac­tive, func­tion­al and above all cli­mate-friend­ly design of vehi­cle inte­ri­ors also plays a role that should not be underestimated.

Against this back­ground, the com­pa­ny is cur­rent­ly estab­lish­ing an inno­va­tion net­work togeth­er with experts from indus­try and sci­ence, in par­tic­u­lar Europe’s largest nat­ur­al his­to­ry muse­um (Senck­en­berg Gesellschaft für Natur­forschung) and knowl­edge­able mate­ri­als researchers from uni­ver­si­ties, as well as renowned com­pa­nies with expe­ri­ence in the pub­lic trans­port sec­tor, in order to iden­ti­fy and devel­op new tech­nolo­gies and appli­ca­tions in the field of mobile inte­ri­ors of the future for local pub­lic trans­port. For exam­ple, Hey­mann GmbH, a spe­cial­ist in form, col­or and func­tion, and the inter­na­tion­al­ly active and award-win­ning design stu­dio Neo­mind have been recruit­ed as found­ing members.

Accord­ing­ly, the aim of the coop­er­a­tion net­work is to devel­op inno­va­tions from man­u­fac­tur­ing tech­nol­o­gy, such as light­weight con­struc­tion, bion­ics and 3D print­ing, for the inte­ri­or in the tech­nol­o­gy areas of all fur­nish­ing ele­ments, such as seats, shelves or sur­faces, as well as func­tion­al sur­faces, light­ing, design or dig­i­tal­iza­tion, and to put them to com­mer­cial use.

In addi­tion, a par­tic­u­lar focus of the net­work is on the use of biodegrad­able plas­tics. With a view to the cli­mate-friend­ly trans­for­ma­tion of our soci­ety, the use of cli­mate-dam­ag­ing mate­ri­als plays a key role not only in the con­struc­tion sec­tor and build­ings, ener­gy effi­cien­cy in man­u­fac­tur­ing and the avoid­ance of waste in the sense of the cir­cu­lar econ­o­my are also high­ly rel­e­vant in the trans­port sec­tor. Bac­te­ria, for exam­ple, can be used to pro­duce biodegrad­able plas­tic. The coop­er­a­tion net­work already has spe­cif­ic research results and pos­si­ble appli­ca­tions for such a process that can be imple­ment­ed in practice.