Kakao Mobility announced Wednesday that it has partnered with Bundang Seoul National University Hospital to expand its "Kakao T Call a Taxi on Behalf" service offline, aiming to support mobility for digitally vulnerable groups.
The partnership is part of Kakao Mobility's ongoing "Digital Barrier-Free" initiative. Previously, Kakao Mobility teamed up with KTis to launch a "114 Call a Taxi on Behalf" service, which has garnered strong response with daily call volume exceeding 300 and cumulative calls surpassing 100,000. While the 114-based phone hailing service improved digital accessibility for mobility-disadvantaged individuals in a non-face-to-face format, this latest partnership is significant in that it provides direct convenience to both users and on-site staff at offline locations.
Kakao Mobility developed a "Taxi Web Dispatch System" tailored to the needs of Bundang Seoul National University Hospital, which receives many visitors who need assistance with taxi use, including elderly patients and foreign nationals. With taxi hailing now easily accessible through work PCs, the service is expected not only to make taxi use more convenient for visitors but also to eliminate the burden on hospital administrative staff who previously had to use their personal mobile phones to call taxis on behalf of patients.
The process is straightforward. When a patient who needs a taxi visits the hospital's information desk and provides a destination, staff use the dedicated system to hail a Kakao T taxi on their behalf. Once a vehicle is dispatched, the patient receives information including the vehicle number, driver contact details, estimated arrival time and boarding location, allowing them to board the taxi safely.
The "Taxi Web Dispatch System" that Kakao Mobility provided to Bundang Seoul National University Hospital can be utilized not only at large hospitals and essential medical facilities but also at senior-exclusive facilities, welfare centers and other locations where mobility support is needed. Kakao Mobility plans to continue exploring partnership opportunities with various institutions and offline locations to improve mobility convenience for transportation-disadvantaged and digitally vulnerable groups.
"We introduced the taxi web hailing service to help elderly and foreign patients return home comfortably after their medical appointments," Song Jung-han, director of Bundang Seoul National University Hospital, said. "We will continue to do our best to create a patient-centered environment and culture so that patients who need extra care can feel a sense of psychological comfort and use the hospital with ease."
"We are pleased to have established an environment that helps elderly patients return home comfortably through this partnership with Bundang Seoul National University Hospital, which is equipped with one of Korea's most advanced medical systems," Ryu Geung-sun, CEO of Kakao Mobility, said. "Kakao Mobility will continue striving to ensure our platform technology spreads as a warm technology that supports all forms of mobility."