Managing IT Projects: Vodafone Australia Intelligent Transport Systems

This case study analyzes Vodafone Australia's Intelligent Transport System (ITS) project. The report begins with an executive summary highlighting the developmental aspects of the project, followed by an introduction and project case analysis. It delves into the current state of IT technology at Vodafone Australia, emphasizing the role of 5G and C-V2X technologies. The discussion covers the impact of ITS on society and organizational success, including a SWOT analysis. The report then explores project selection processes, justifying the use of agile methodology. It evaluates software development tools like Aventri and Idomoo, and aligns the project with Vodafone's strategic goals. The report also provides a project definition, schedule creation methods, and budget management strategies, concluding with suggestions to prevent project failure. References are provided at the end.

Running head: INTELLIGENT TRANSPORT SYSTEM BY VODAFONE AUSTRALIA
Intelligent Transport System by Vodafone Australia
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

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Executive Summary
The discussion in the report would majorly focus over the developmental aspects of Intelligent
Transport Systems by Vodafone in Australia. This report helps in understanding the critical
aspects related to the development of the technology and the importance of project management
concepts in relation to the development of the case. The report also justifies the proper kind of
methodology that would be used in the context of the project and which could be considered as
helpful for proper conducting of each of the phases. The final part of discussion over the project
emphasizes on the importance of managing the project within schedule and budget, while also
discussing whether the project would be considered as successful for the company in the future
days.

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Table of Contents
1. Introduction and Analysis of Project Case..................................................................................3
2. Discussion....................................................................................................................................4
2.1 Evaluation of Current state of IT Technology in Vodafone, Australia.................................4
2.3 Impact of Intelligent Transport Systems on Society and Organizational Success................5
2.4 Processes and Methods of Project Selection.........................................................................7
2.5 Justification of chosen methodology for project execution...................................................8
2.6 Evaluation of tools used in software development processes................................................9
2.7 Analysis of chosen project and alignment with strategic goals.............................................9
2.8 Project definition.................................................................................................................10
2.9 Method used for creating project schedule..........................................................................11
2.10 Methods for keeping the project within budget.................................................................13
2.11 Suggestions towards preventing project failure.................................................................14
3. Conclusion.................................................................................................................................15
References......................................................................................................................................16

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1. Introduction and Analysis of Project Case
Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) can be considered as one of the most innovative kind
of technological innovation of the decade. With the primary concept of smart city transforming
towards digital societies, ITS would be becoming as an indispensable component among all the
citizens. With the purpose of leveraging citizens with the use of ITS, it would help in saving their
valuable time (Intelligent Transport System, 2020). It further helps in enriching users with local
convenience, providing prior information in relation to real-time traffic, supporting information
about seat availability and others. This would further help towards reduction of travel time for
various commuters while enhancing the comfort and safety.
According to recent reports by Vodafone Australia, the prediction of the autonomous
cars, which would be helping people in their daily routines, it has been predicted that the market
would be hit with $42 billion USD. The rise in the technology would also be able to create nearly
100,000 jobs by the year 2025.
In the recent times, with the growth of vehicles on the roads, traffic congestion is on a
major rise. Drivers mainly fail to establish a communication in real-time scenarios thus leading
to improper updates of road traffic, determining the time to reach somewhere and many other
aspects (Carutasu, Coculescu & Botezatu, 2017). With the implementation of smart transport
systems on roads, it would be majorly helpful to bring in value towards the transportation system
while leading efficient ways of travelling.
With the launch of the major initiative by Vodafone, the primary objectives set by the
business are:

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 Emerging as a technology leader while enabling a digital society
 Extending the reach of technology with the impact of autonomous cars
 Transforming the traditional modes of transport while bringing in new kind of
technologies to transform the sector
 Developing smarter, safer and efficient ways of transport
2. Discussion
2.1 Evaluation of Current state of IT Technology in Vodafone, Australia
According to recent reports being published by various tech-companies, it has been
understood that the revolution created by self-driving cars would primarily rely on the
establishment of a network. This network would help towards support intelligent communication
between cars. According to Vodafone, the implementation of self-driving cars would need the
massive strength ultra-reliable networks (Kerr & Moloney, 2019). It would also require low-
latency and should have the capability of working anywhere and in any situation.
Hence, the company has focused over strengthening their 5G technology, which they plan
to implement within the cars based on enhancing the architecture of the network and maintain
strong communication throughout. In the present state of development of ITS and launching the
primary model of intelligent vehicle on the roads, it can be discussed that Vodafone has been
continuously struggling to developing a new technology that would be highly efficient in nature
(Azab et al., 2016). Since the inception of the thinking, Vodafone has launched a 5G Mobility
Laboratory, which would be the primary place for conducting actual tests and usage of 5G
systems within the cars. The company has been in the process of testing C-V2X, which is a new

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technology useful for supporting the primary feature of transport safety. It is thus considered as a
part of the ITS, which helps in connecting roadside infrastructure, vehicles and pedestrians.
The company is presently working towards the development of the automotive industry
for supporting towards the development and manufacturing of intelligent vehicles. These cars
would incorporate C-V2X that would also be combined with high-bandwidth and low-latency
network connectivity (Vukadinovic et al., 2018). With the combination of 5G and C-V2X
technology, these technologies would be able to enable towards the increase of assisted and
automated driving, thus enabling towards a leading transformation over the ways in which
vehicles could be used in a better manner.
2.3 Impact of Intelligent Transport Systems on Society and Organizational Success
The development of the ITS technology by Vodafone, it would majorly bring in a major
changes towards the transport sector. From the understanding of the growing needs of the
government to transport the present form of transport systems and the initiatives taken by
Vodafone to support the economy, a SWOT analysis over the organizational initiatives based on
ITS can be conducted:
Strengths
1. The innovation capability of Vodafone is considered to be tremendous. Latest system
upgrades and bringing in new concepts can be considered as their major strength.
2. The organization has made their worldwide presence in different countries (Sammut‐
Bonnici & Galea, 2015). The country primarily tests their services in different countries from
where the tested product would be launched in Australia.

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3. Vodafone has a large subscriber base and thus their designed products would be
greatly used by customers on a worldwide basis.
4. The company would also be able to strongly advertise for their services, which would
be launched. This can be considered as a great strategy for reaching out to a broad number of
customers.
Weakness
1. In realisation to the current technology being developed, it can be discussed that
Vodafone does not have a strong presence in rural areas. Hence, they would not be able to
propagate the technology to such sectors of people.
2. In present times, Vodafone has lost their market valuation. High competition, market
saturation and sluggish form of economic growth have led to the factor (Ang, 2016). Hence, the
innovative ITS technology would have to struggle to create a positive impact over the customer
mind.
Opportunities
1. Since, Vodafone does not have a strong reach in rural areas, hence the development of
ITS technological systems would prove to create the best impact over the minds of the people.
2. With the rise of mobile users and internet technology, people interested in purchasing
vehicles would be interested in purchasing new vehicles developed by Vodafone (Orlando,
2016).

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3. Implementation of 5G technology within the vehicles would be an easy opportunity for
the company to propagate the technology and bring in major changes towards the automotive
industry.

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Threats
1. The only threat faced by Vodafone is the stiff form of competition in the automobile
market. In recent times, Tesla Motors and Uber are the prime competitors who are also in the
phase of designing new technology for vehicles and improving the transport systems.
According to the understanding of the SWOT analysis, it can be discussed that the
particular project has been selected for the case study in order to understand the present state of
operations of Vodafone in Australia. The company has a huge reputation in the
telecommunication sector while also engaging with the automobile sector with the
implementation of 5G supported communication model (Owusu-Ansah, 2019). Hence, this case
study is considered as useful and interesting to understand the ways in which a
telecommunication company would be able to bring in major changes towards the society.
2.4 Processes and Methods of Project Selection
Based on understanding the project requirements, the processes and methods that would
be selected for selecting the project for developing an ITS are:
a. Payback Period – It is defined as the total ratio of total cash made to the average of
per period cash (Gorshkov et al., 2018). The company should be able to decide the time that
would be taken for them to recover from the total investment made over a project.
b. Net Present Value – It is calculated as the difference between the current value of
cash inflow from the project to the current cash outflow from the project. IN consideration to the
project, the company should decide whether the NPV is positive. Based on considering the NPV,
it would help the company in understanding the future value of investment that would be made in
the present times.

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c. Benefit or Cost ratio – It is considered as the ratio between the Present Value of cash
inflow or the total amount of investment made over the concerned project to the Present Value of
cash outflow (Newcomer, Hatry & Wholey, 2015). The projects that would be considered to
having a higher form of Benefit-Cost ratio as compared to lower Cost-Benefit ratio would be
necessarily be chosen.
2.5 Justification of chosen methodology for project execution
There are a broad number of methodologies that could be selected for performing work
over any concerned project. However, the current context of the scenario for the development of
ITS by Vodafone Australia, it can be discussed that agile methodology would need to be selected
(Getto, 2015). This is primarily due to the reason because in this project, considerations might
change with the changing forms of technological aspects and improved algorithmic
developments. Future perspectives might change during the development phase and new
inclusions might need to be incorporated during every phase of testing approaches.
With the inclusion of agile methodology for the concerned project, it can be discussed
that agile methodologies are considered as highly flexible in nature. With the changing nature of
project specifications and varying customer requirements over time, the team members at
Vodafone would be able to maintain high mobility and be highly responsive in nature (Edeki,
2015). Agile methodology is thus considered to be the modern form of strategy adopted in
project management, which could be helpful towards the progress of the project initiated by
Vodafone.

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2.6 Evaluation of tools used in software development processes
In relation to the development of software applications during the process of development
of system development, the tools that would be used are:
1. Aventri – It is considered as one of the leading data-driven, venue sourcing, end-to-
end event management and cloud-based analytics software solutions, which is currently in major
use by Vodafone (Ghobadi & Mathiassen, 2016). The software tool emphasizes towards driving
innovative kind of technology solutions for the process of streamlining of process, events and
providing real-time statistical data and supporting the analytics.
2. Idomoo – The software tool helps in delivering promises made in the aspects of
customer personalization while addressing them in an effective manner. They help in delivering
most effective form of customer engagement programs connecting the brand with their
customers.
2.7 Analysis of chosen project and alignment with strategic goals
Intelligent Transport Systems is considered as a great move made by Vodafone in the
aspect of reaching out to the global world. The primary objective of the company is to bring in a
positive culture in the world based on impacting the mind of customers with their technological
progress (Husain et al., 2018). The company also thinks of the various opportunities before them
in the future based on the development of new kind of car products. Some of the major
innovations that are being brought in within the sector of ITS includes augmented reality within
their surrounding environment and mixed virtual reality projections based on windscreens.
The development of the new technological infrastructure would primarily integrate within
the infrastructure of smart cities (Elia et al., 2019). Based on the kind of recent developments in

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cities, the impact of ITS would be helpful for customers in estimating the nearest charging point
for electric vehicles, compare prices while also helping towards management of demand.
2.8 Project definition
Project Scope – The project is based on defining a new system of travel in Australia,
which would be backup up by intelligent and smart systems. Vodafone is planning towards the
implementation of intelligent transport systems in Australia where they would be making use of
their 5G technological architecture to bring in major changes towards the economy.
While defining the scope of the project, the development team should define certain user
stories for each particular kind of feature and their detailed functionality within the project. This
would help the manufacturing team to carefully understand each of them and work towards the
development of the project in a phased wise manner (Zhao et al., 2018). Each of the user stories
could be considered as sprints in which developers would need to perform the allocated task
diligently and test them properly only after which they would be moving on to the next phase of
development.
Major features – From the understanding and knowledge of the project, the major
features within the project could be considered as follows:
1. The ITS would enable better form of management of vehicular traffic and lead to less
congestion of roads.
2. With such systems, the vision of autonomous cars would be accomplished
(Panchapakesan, 2019).