DIF Project

Digitally transforming peer-to-peer car buying and selling

Yousif Memon’s (CST ’17) passion for cars has transformed into an app that is transforming peer-to-peer purchasing of automobiles.

Kuaay began in 2020 when Memon returned to Temple University for Techstars’ “Startup Weekend.” He, along with Keenan Hawekotte, won the competition for their pitch which evolved into Kuaay – a peer-to-peer car buying platform.

Since then, according to Memom we’ve added payment transfer, DMV docs for all 50 states, VIN check, vehicle valuation tools, and shipping to the app. That means the next time I go out to buy a car, my phone is all I need. No more paper and pens, no waiting for the bank to open, and no begging friends and family for rides. I can get the car home and register right on my phone.

IBIT’s Digital Innovation Foundry (DIF) connected with Kuaay through their entry into Temple’s Idea Competition. DIF’s initial goal was to assist Kuaay on implementation and platform architecture. DIF brought in Stephen Hullender, now a recent Temple Computer Science graduate (CST’22), to lead the implementation of a key enabler for Kuaay – notary capabilities.

Now, Hullender has expanded his role into design and navigation and developing algorithms to ease transactions between two parties, especially across state lines. Learning how a mobile app works and contributing to the app’s development improved my confidence. I was able to obtain a wide breadth of knowledge in software development and architecting a solution.

Memon notes we came out of the gate solving niche problems for real people and are on the way to solve bigger problems for even more people by digitizing the entire purchase, shipping, and registration cycle associated with peer-to-peer car buying. Memon added that DIF support and platform architecture guidance has been invaluable in helping us move forward.

Manoj Chacko, Associate Director, IBIT, who manages the DIF – Kuaay relationship including providing advice on platform architecture, notes: Kuaay has the potential to completely digitize and simplify the way someone sells or purchases a used car across state lines.

Going forward, DIF is expanding its relationship with Kuaay into business mentoring and researching the used car buying market.

The mission of DIF which is part of the Institute for Business and Information Technology (IBIT) is to generate innovation by assessing, integrating, and prototyping digital technologies in collaboration with industry, startups, faculty and students. See: https://ibit.temple.edu/DIF

Learn more about Kuaay at: https://www.kuaay.com/

Cencora – Digitally transforming the tracking of pharmaceutical products

Every day, healthcare solutions leader Cencora (a Fortune 10 company) ships pharmaceutical products and treatments to customers such as pharmacies and hospitals. Each shipment leaves from one of the company’s state-of-the-art distribution centers in totes. The totes are durable and designed to be reused — but there was currently no process in place to track what happened to the empty totes after initial use.

DIF Role

Create an enhanced tracking methodology to track totes, considering cost, reliability, usability, and integration with existing systems. Additionally, the solution should account for change management and its impact on team member processes.

Cencora Representatives

DIF Consultant

DIF Awards

Russell Abernethy, Recipient of the Fall 2022 Digital Innovation Foundry Scholarship

Impact

“The work was relevant and useful. We are often heads down into our day-to-day operations, and so greatly benefited from a new perspective that our partnership with the Digital Innovation Foundry brought” Tanmay Bandyopadhyay

Jeremy Shafer and Yan Wang managed this project for DIF

Lab-scale Testbed for Mixed Human-Autonomous Vehicle Traffic Research

Lab-scale Testbed for Mixed Human-Autonomous Vehicle Traffic Research

Led by Dr. Philip Dames and students from Temple’s College of Engineering, the project developed a scaled robotic testbed for connected and automated vehicles (CAVs). The testbed can be used to study system-level flow characteristics of mixed human-CAV traffic, which, to date, has received very little attention compared to existing traffic flow or the safety of automated vehicles.

There are many simulation-based studies of traffic, however, there are few experimental results. This project bridges the divide by reducing the cost, effort, and risk. The project will enable the CAV community to (a) rapidly prototype and study levels of connectivity between CAVs and human-driven vehicles, and (b) evaluate coordinated CAVs algorithms to modulate traffic flows.

The DIF project laid the foundation for an NSF award, which is currently under review.

Lab-scale Testbed for Mixed Human-Autonomous Vehicle Traffic Research

The DIF project laid the foundation for an NSF award, which is currently under review.

Employee Professional Development and Engagement

In today’s fast changing environment, the upskilling, development, and engagement of employees has become critical, especially when the economy is near full employment. Led by Munir Mandviwalla, Laurel Miller, and Manoj Chacko, the DIF team is working with Scholastic, Inc. to apply the PRO Community platform to develop and engage employees. To date, a pilot was successfully completed focused on reskilling and retention. A larger scale deployment is being planned.

The platform is now a Temple University spin-off company that applies a data driven, visible, and measurable approach to employee engagement and development.