Zippe
Performing a Full Cycle of Android & iOS Mobile App Development
How TopDevs mobile app developers helped a UK taxi operator to create a taxi booking app like Uber with a simple, fast, and convenient dispatch system
Logistics & Tracking
United Kingdom
July 2023 - In Progress
Mobile
Project Summary
Zippe is a taxi operator specializing in transporting passengers throughout the south-west of the UK, in particular in the cities of Bath and North East Somerset. Currently, their primary focus is providing safe and reliable transportation of children from home to school without the need for complex dispatch systems. For that, they receive financial support from local councils.
However, the Zippe stakeholders are looking to expand their business and offer customers a convenient way to order a taxi, similar to popular apps such as Uber.
To achieve this ambitious goal, they plan to develop a mobile application of their own for clients and taxi drivers.
Project Summary
Zippe is a taxi operator specializing in transporting passengers throughout the south-west of the UK, in particular in the cities of Bath and North East Somerset. Currently, their primary focus is providing safe and reliable transportation of children from home to school without the need for complex dispatch systems. For that, they receive financial support from local councils.
However, the Zippe stakeholders are looking to expand their business and offer customers a convenient way to order a taxi, similar to popular apps such as Uber.
To achieve this ambitious goal, they plan to develop a mobile application of their own for clients and taxi drivers.
Business Value
What sets their business approach apart is that instead of hiring telephone operators, they give customers the ability to communicate with Zippe via text chat using the Intercom platform.
This approach allows the taxi company to simplify the passenger transportation process, making taxi booking faster, more convenient, and accessible for all their customers.
Services
- iOS App Development
- Android App Development
- UX/UI Design
- Project Management
- Delivery Management
Team
- 1 iOS App Developer
- 1 Android App Developer
- 1 UX/UI Designer
- 1 Project Manager
- 1 Delivery Manager
Target Audience
Taxi Operators, Taxi Drivers, Taxi Clients, Transportation Companies, Logistics Business
Tech Stack
Kotlin, MVVM app with Clean Architecture, Modularization, Android Jetpack Compose and Material 3 for UI, Jetpack Libraries (Paging, Navigation, Dagger Hilt, Room, Datastore, WorkManager, Splashscreen), Google Accompanist Libraries, Kotlin Coroutines + Flow, Kotlinx Serialization + Protobuf (for Datastore), Gson, Coil for loading images, OkHttp + Retrofit, Google Maps SDK for Android, Maps SDK for Android Utility Library, libphonenumber
Swift, Alamofire, KeychainSwift, Apple Map
Mobile App Requirements
A well-known UK taxi operator conceived the taxi app development for its region that will eliminate telephone operators and, thus, provide efficient and convenient taxi booking services.
The major stakeholders of the UK-based taxi company were looking for an outsourcing partner to provide native mobile app development services and ongoing support before, during, and after the application launch.
To qualify for this role, the TopDevs engineering team needed to meet the stated demands for the app's functionality and quality. Besides strong experience in mobile application development, the outsourcing team had to meet functional and non-functional requirements.
Functional App Requirements
The first version of the taxi booking app should provide users with the ability to place bookings with the most possible simplicity.
TimeBook for now, no option for a time choice
Pickup locationCan be defaulted to the user's GPS location
Destination locationUser needs to type it in
In-app paymentsThe taxi booking platform supports cash payments by default
Location selection via mapInstead, the app should show users their route on a static map before they confirm
Users need to be able to cancel bookings they make until the driver marks them as having entered the car. After that, the driver is responsible for the taxi order completion.
In case of inconsistency with the app functionality, users should receive warning messages when they are outside of the taxi order app service area or create a duplicated booking while there is an ongoing one.
To comply with the local legal regulations, the application can't accept anonymous bookings. So it requires registration and authentication system development for users.
Users should be able to view the list of all taxi orders they have ever made along with the corresponding data about each of them.
Non-Functional App Requirements
There was a whole stack of non-functional requirements for the app development, including the following:
Zippe brandingZippe branding should be used for app icons on the Android or iOS home screen, as well as on splash screens.
Correct workAll screens should work correctly without being stuck no matter if the network drops, or if users press the Android Back button or close the keyboard.
Errors/exceptionsErrors/exceptions should not limit the overall app operating and never lead to app crashes, any recovery modes should never cause the app to restart.
Good UX performance, in particular:
- Streamlined yet simple user interface;
- No "jank";
- Appropriate UI states: loading, submit, or busy;
- Timely user feedback on interactions.
- Delivery Management
Efficient maintainability:
- Use an easy-to-maintain component library and avoid making advanced customizations when possible;
- Use automated testing to support refactoring.
Automated regression testing.
Automated deployment.
Compliance with Google and Apple's permissions systems, correctly configured prompts to users when asking for location permissions, etc.
Mobile App Development Challenges
The major UK-based taxi company, primarily focused on the kids' transportation from home to school, has realized the potential of its logistics service expansion.
Its stakeholders have decided to provide a taxi booking service for everyone in its region via an easy-to-use mobile application.
TopDevs mobile development company became their choice as a reliable and highly experienced outsourcing technology partner.
With over a decade of native Android and iOS mobile development expertise, our engineering team has decided to gather the major client's requirements for the application, formulate them into a plan of action, and solve all the possible challenges most efficiently.
The main task besides our mobile app developers was to create a mobile application that should be as simple as possible, yet provide a high level of taxi booking services.
No intermediaries in the form of additional telephone staff. No extra features like in-app purchases or location selection on a map as it requires additional performance-consuming resources.
Just pick up the user where he or she is and transport a person to the address they input, starting from the moment of the booking. No crashes, no freezes, no restarts even when the network drops.
Just a minimum of warning messages and strict delivery of the required taxi booking services through a mobile app.
Despite a pretty unique stack of functional and non-functional app requirements, our app development team has managed to create native mobile apps with a minimum yet sophisticated set of features that serve the initial goal of the mobile development project.
Mobile App Development Solutions
According to the main app development requirements, the TopDevs mobile development team has built mobile applications for Android and iOS users that can use the following functionality:
All the users need to do on their path through the taxi booking process is to type in the destination location and confirm the booking after viewing the calculated route on a static map.
After the driver assignment, users can track the route in real-time and get a notification when their driver arrives at their pickup location which is identified by the current user's GPS location.
Outside of the Zippe service area - users get a clear notification that they cannot use Zippe in their area yet.
One ongoing booking at a time - even being signed into multiple devices, users are restricted to making more than one booking at a time.
Booking cancellation is possible only till the point when users get into the car and their driver marks it in the app.
After that, a driver takes part and is responsible for completing a booking till the destination point.
Users can observe a list of all bookings they have ever made through the app - either ongoing, canceled, or completed.
It provides all the necessary information including the date, route, and cost of each booking. Ongoing orders also show the real-time update of the order process.
User-End Flow
Mobile App Development Results
As experience proves, various businesses can expand their services and user base through a well-developed mobile application. That is exactly what a UK-based taxi operator received from the TopDevs app development company.
We have helped our client to deliver a simple yet sophisticated mobile application for Android and iOS users. This way, a taxi company gets a new channel of customer acquisition. And people from the southwest of the UK can book a taxi through a modern mobile app without a hassle.
Our Android and iOS mobile app developers made sure that the taxi booking app provides the necessary minimum of services with maximum convenience and performance stability using top-notch technologies like Swift and Kotlin.
Our UX/UI designers ensured good UX performance along with an attractive user interface.
A wide range of functional and non-functional requirements was a challenge we were glad to anticipate. Our experienced and proactive TopDevs mobile app development team has put all the efforts into the best possible implementation of a client's business expansion idea.
The TopDevs mobile app development company helped an existing offline business to implement an idea for the expansion of its services through a simple mobile app.
Our engineering team has built a mobile application with a simple yet comprehensive set of features in the taxi booking niche.
