Hong Kong taxi fleet, HKU roll out city’s first AI-powered dispatch system

A taxi fleet has partnered with the University of Hong Kong for the launch of the city’s first AI-powered cab dispatch system, which the operator has said improves efficiency, service quality and order acceptance rates.

The “Smart Dispatch Decision System” processes large volumes of real-time data such as road traffic status, weather and battery levels of electric cabs to assign orders, according to taxi fleet SynCab and the Smart Mobility Lab of the university’s faculty of engineering.

Sonia Cheng Man-yee, founder and executive director of SynCab, said on Monday that drivers who opted to take bookings from the artificial intelligence-powered dispatch system would be given orders without an option to reject them, which could help shorten the match time.

“This could help our vehicles to be more efficient, as well as help enhance service quality and order acceptance rates,” she said. “Drivers also have to learn to trust the system that the orders given to them will be the best.”

She said the system had a soft launch in January and before a full roll-out on July 14 as it gathered more data, highlighting that orders placed and taken last month both doubled those of June.

SynCab operates 160 vehicles, all of which are equipped with the system. Cheng added that her fleet would have up to 425 taxis using the system in the future, but did not reveal a timeline.