UK-South Korea partnership reaches key milestone in two-year collaborative project to revolutionise public transport optimisation.

Alchera Technologies hosted a delegation from Ciel, a leading South Korean mobility company, at its London headquarters on 20-21 November 2025 to advance their joint development of an innovative AI-powered bus optimisation platform. The two-day summit marked a significant milestone in the internationally-funded project, now in its second year.

The collaboration, supported by Innovate UK and the Korea Institute for Advancement of Technology (KIAT), is developing a comprehensive solution that combines Alchera’s predictive analytics expertise with Ciel’s mobility platform to create an integrated bus service encompassing both Dynamic Responsive Transit (DRT) and traditional timetabled routes.

Business, research and management teams from both organisations convened to review progress and chart the path forward. Key outcomes included the successful deployment of new Alchera predictive models, which Ciel is using to dynamically forecast passenger demand and anticipate congestion patterns. The partners agreed to strengthen data sharing protocols, enabling tighter integration between their respective platforms and allowing each organisation to leverage the other’s technological developments.

The solution employs digital twin technology and reinforcement learning to generate sophisticated passenger demand predictions based on historical data, road traffic patterns and event information. This AI-driven approach is designed to serve modern regional populations across both densely populated urban areas—with testing already undertaken in Seoul—and less densely populated rural communities, ensuring inclusive and accessible transit for all.

Anna Jordan, CEO of Alchera Technologies, said: “This visit represents the strength of our partnership with Ciel and our shared commitment to transforming public transport through intelligent technology. As we enter the next year of this partnership, we’re seeing our predictive models deliver value in understanding and responding to passenger needs. Together, we’re building a solution that will help transport operators serve their communities more efficiently, whether in bustling city centres or rural regions. The future of public transport is data-driven, responsive and truly accessible.”

The partnership builds upon both companies’ established commercial success in productising advanced machine learning solutions for the transport sector. Alchera continues to extend its benefits across UK local authorities, whilst the collaboration positions both partners to bring this innovative solution to market for transport operators seeking to optimise service delivery in challenging, dynamic environments.

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