PRESS RELEASE – Citec and BePooler: strategic partnership to promote carpooling and sustainable mobility

This strategic collaboration brings together two complementary areas of expertise: Citec Group’s transport engineering and Engitel’s digital know-how, a long-standing technology partner of BePooler. Together, they aim to take the BePooler application to the next level. Founded in Switzerland in 2015, BePooler has become a recognized player in short-distance daily carpooling, with a simple idea: providing companies, institutions, local authorities, and individual users with a fast and secure way to share their commute. BePooler’s key feature is offering users the ability to reserve dedicated parking spaces at their destination, an especially attractive function for carpoolers. It also enables companies to optimize parking space usage in a context of limited resources.

« It is a great opportunity for BePooler to join a family of mobility specialists. The idea now is to move to the next level, both technologically and geographically, by leveraging the expertise and international presence of a group like Citec » explains Mirko Baruffini, founder of BePooler. « Our group’s expertise covers the entire mobility chain. With this acquisition, we will be able to develop the carpooling offer across Switzerland and beyond. » adds Franco Tufo, CEO of Citec Group.

An optimized user experience

This collaboration is already bearing fruit. Since late January 2025, the new BePooler app has been available on the App Store and Google Play. This enhanced version includes innovative features such as multimodal tracking: users can now log not only their carpooling trips but also journeys made by public transport, bike, or on foot, for a complete overview of their mobility habits. Passengers can now also scan the driver’s QR code at pickup and drop-off, ensuring reliable trip logging. With CO2 savings statistics, gamification tools, and a refreshed interface, this version improves the user experience while encouraging more sustainable mobility.

Challenges of commuter carpooling in Switzerland

Carpooling is a key tool to ease traffic congestion and reduce gridlock, which amounted to 50,000 hours in 2023 on Swiss national roads. According to the Swiss Federal Statistical Office (OFS), the average car occupancy rate in Switzerland is 1.6 people, dropping to just 1.1 for commuter traffic. This low occupancy rate highlights a significant optimization potential. Additionally, nearly 30 % of daily distances traveled in Switzerland are related to commuting, two-thirds of which are done by private car. By encouraging ride-sharing, BePooler aims to reduce traffic, costs, private vehicle use, and pollution. Today, the app has logged more than 2 million shared kilometers, 15’000 active users, and manages 27’000 parking spaces.

About Citec

Founded in 1994, Citec is an independent group of engineering and consulting firms specializing in transport planning, management, infrastructure design, and regulation. Based in Switzerland, the group has more than 150 employees across 15 offices in Switzerland, France, and Italy. Fully owned by its employees, Citec achieved a turnover of CHF 20 million in 2024. Following the integration of Interface Transport, a specialist in freight mobility and urban logistics in 2018, Playground, an event engineering company in 2022, and Modelity, a digital company dedicated to decarbonizing commuter mobility in 2024, Citec group is now expanding its service portfolio for more sustainable mobility with the acquisition of BePooler.

www.citec.ch/en/

About BePooler

BePooler is a short-distance carpooling platform dedicated to companies, institutions, and local authorities. Founded in Switzerland in 2015, it expanded to Italy in 2016 and has established itself as a model of sustainable mobility, notably receiving the Swiss HEIG-VD Ethics Award in 2023. Now acquired by Citec SA, BePooler SA will continue its operations in Switzerland. In other countries, management will be handled by licensees Engitel and Citec. Engitel will oversee platform administration and technological development.

https://www.bepooler.com/en/

About Engitel

Engitel is a digital company combining creativity and software development, with offices in Milan, Turin, and San Francisco. Specializing in web and mobile technology from the outset, it now focuses on Web 3.0. Its offering is fully tailored, blending high-level technology with creativity. Engitel has a team of around 65 employees and a diverse client portfolio, ranging from banks to real estate developers, major Italian brands, and international corporations.

www.engitel.com