Transport for NSW scores mass-market award for Opal Connect

Transport for NSW’s Opal Connect digital ticketing and payments platform was named the top mass-market IT project at the iTnews Benchmark Awards 2020.

The new account-based platform provides a new way for customers to keep track of all their public transport payments, whether this is via Opal card or credit or debit cards.

It has been built entirely in-house using a modern serverless architecture that uses cloud-native services from Amazon Web Services.

While the platform was only introduced last October, it will form the foundation of TfNSW’s planned trial of a virtual equivalent of the Opal card late this year.

The government is also pinning its hopes on the platform becoming the foundation for a Netflix-style subscription service for transport services, whereby commuters would pay a weekly or monthly fee.

In this future, this has the potential to cover not only public transport journeys, but trips through ride sharing platforms like Uber, taxis, parking and tolling.

You can read more about TfNSW's work alongside the other winning projects and finalists here.

Winners were announced at the iTnews Benchmark Awards 2020 gala dinner held at KPMG’s Sydney Office in Barangaroo.