Sunway acquires smart parking system for RM4mil
KUALA LUMPUR: Sunway Group has forked out RM4mil to acquire Jieshun’s China-based technology to have the first and largest smart parking system with multi cashless payment options.
This marks the country’s first and largest unified licence plate recognition (LPR) system with multiple-payment options involving 10,000 car park bays in Sunway.
Sunway Malls and Theme Parks chief executive officer H. C. Chan said the system would be rolled out to the public in six integrated car parks of Sunway Group by the end of the first quarter of 2020.
The six car parks include Sunway Pyramid mall, Sunway Resort Hotel & Spa, Sunway Clio Hotel, Sunway Pyramid Hotel, Sunway Pinnacle office tower and Menara Sunway office tower.
“At Sunway Malls, we see cashless convenience ought not be restricted to retail payment alone but extended to peripheral services like the carpark.
“By doing that, it essentially means the creation of not just a payment channel but an entire payment eco-system, whereby the end result is better customer experience,” Chan said during a media briefing of Sunway Smart Parking preview.
Currently, the system is online for season parking only.
With regard to the cashless payment options, customers would have a total of 12 options to pay for cashless parking via the ‘Sunway Smart Parking’ app.
The payment solution providers on board include GrabPay, Boost, WeChat Pay, Alipay, Touch N’ Go Digital, and Maybank QR alongside credit partners MasterCard, Visa, American Express, JCB, UnionPay, and MyDebit.
Given the wide acceptance of debit and credit cards, Chan noted that cashless payment had been a significant part of business for the Malaysian retail industry, estimating that RM150bil of sales transactions at the 600 malls throughout the country annually.
“At Sunway Malls, we envisage this as only the beginning of the cashless revolution with much potential for many upsides.
“Hence, that is why we have embarked to extend this to car-park payment for seamless convenience,” he added.
Meanwhile, Sunway shopping malls general manager Jason Chin said the traditional ticket car parking payment system would eventually be halted after one year.
“Now, the current system will run together with the LPR system.
“But, we will look at the situation to decided when we can halt it.
“We target to halt the traditional system after one year,” he added.
The success rate of the LPR technology is currently around 95% in Malaysia, while in China it has reached around 99.7%.
Moving forward, Sunway Malls chief operating officer Kevin G. P. Tan said the data collected from the technology would be utilised to allow car owners to locate their cars in carkparks in the future.
Source: TheStar