San Diego, CA, June 4, 2019 – In an unprecedented move, Q-Free publicly released the management information bases (known as MIBs) to its award-winning MAXTIME ic local traffic signal control software. The announcement was made on the opening day of the Intelligent Transportation Society of America’s (ITS America) Annual Meeting taking place in Washington, D.C. through Friday. Q-Free is the first supplier in the North American traffic signal control industry to openly share its MIBs, underscoring the company’s steadfast commitment to open standards and the commuting public.

Openly sharing MIBs enables multi-vendor solutions to work, giving departments of transportation the freedom to select the best solution for their needs and avoid being locked into a current vendor or paying integration fees. It also promotes fair and open competition, deterring price discrimination and preventing tax payers from overpaying for their transportation infrastructure.

Driving innovation and interoperability
In a market steeped in proprietary, manufacturer-defined solutions, Q-Free aims to foster an environment rich with innovation and collaboration – two crucial components in achieving smart city goals.

“We hope other manufacturers will follow our lead,” said Morten Andersson, SVP for Q-Free America. “The transportation industry is evolving at an unprecedented pace because of gamechangers like big data, crowd sourcing, connected and driverless vehicles. It is now more important than ever for us to band together to ensure a safe, efficient, and sustainable transportation network built on innovation and cooperation.”

Building the future of advanced transportation
MIBs provide a common language for central traffic management systems and local controller software to communicate. For traffic signal operations, the MIBs are used to control traffic signals and other transportation management devices. While approximately half of the objects found in the MIBs for advanced transportation controllers (ATC) have been standardized, the remaining objects are manufacturer specific. This severely limits interoperability between devices and systems from different vendors and impedes customers from choosing the best available products and solutions from multiple vendors. Sharing MIBs freely between manufacturers can alleviate these problems.

To learn more, visit the Q-Free booth, #213, during ITS America.