Motion Digest Network

Tumpang, Malaysia’s first flat-rate ride-sharing service, is no longer on the roads. It is now providing on-demand solutions to start-ups and businesses using its existing tech infrastructure.

Tumpang was originally started as a flat-rate ride-sharing service, charging RM5 per short trip within a 3km radius around train stations. The objective was to provide first-mile and last-mile connectivity via existing taxis for urban commuters.

Now, Tumpang has changed its direction to become a technological provider instead, according to its website. Using the infrastructure built for its original ride-sharing service, it is now offering customised platforms for on-demand businesses, aimed at both start-ups and more established operations.

Tumpang’s two main products are an on-demand platform as well as an asset tracking system.

For on-demand platforms, Tumpang offers app design with customisable user interface that can be ready to be rolled out in just two weeks. Its platform design covers both Android and iOs with a cloud-driven architecture.

Meantime Tumpang’s asset tracking system helps the customer manage a fleet of vehicles via real-time tracking that feeds data straight to the customer’s dashboard for easy monitoring.

Tumpang offers subscription plans ranging from three months up to a year for the start-up package, with monthly fees starting from USD$100 a month for the 12-month package.

For other businesses seeking to subscribe to Tumpang platform for more than 12 months under the enterprise package, the pricing is open for negotiations, based on its website.

However, customers going for a three-month or six-month subscription will only get a mobile web app and a website with Tumpang’s domain name. The one-year plan comes with a fully customised URL and a native Android app.

For an iOS app, customers would incur a one-time customisation fee of around USD$1,000. All packages are subject to hourly fees for further development work, ranging from USD$35 to USD$25 per hour.

Source: Tumpang.la

Tumpang says platforms are deployable within five to six working days.

Tumpang’s new business model is similar to India-based V3CUBE, which offers customisable web and mobile apps for ride-sharing start-ups.

One difference however is that V3CUBE’s licensed code is open and fully modifiable by the customer. That feature is similar to California-based GitHub, another platform provider that gives customers access to source codes for customisation purposes.

In addition V3CUBE also caters to a more international market, as it allows the apps to be localised in terms of language and currency. The tech company says it has delivered over 1,200 projects worldwide since 2005.

For Tumpang, an immediate challenge will be gaining customer confidence in its services, especially in terms of data protection. A possible area of concern may be competitive risk of having valuable ride-sharing data, such as a database of users and recruited drivers, sitting in a third-party access system.

Such concern would be heightened once the accumulated data reaches critical mass. In addition, that competitive risk is intertwined with possible concerns over the integrity and security of Tumpang’s storage systems against data theft.

In a reply to Motion Digest, Tumpang says security is not a concern as the platform uses dockerised containers to segregate customer data. In other words, one client’s data is segregated from another client’s database.

“Customers own their data – it’s their own virtual server,” says Tumpang via email. “It’s not shared storage between customers.”

However it does not elaborate on its cybersecurity protection measures to safeguard consumer data.

Additionally, Tumpang’s website says customers may migrate out of its platform anytime, saying Tumpang does not take ownership of the customer’s data and service information.

“Of course, we’ll have agreements with each customer that would include non-compete clauses and so on,” Tumpang adds.