text: Chair of Connected Mobility: M.Sc. Topic: Extending a Mobility Platform App for Carsharing, Scooter Sharing and Bike Sharing Services by Pleasant Route Recommendations
  M.Sc. Topic: Extending a Mobility Platform App for Carsharing, Scooter Sharing and Bike Sharing Services by Pleasant Route Recommendations
  The thesis is conducted in cooperation with a mobility platform which allows you to use various carsharing, scooter sharing and bike sharing services from one app. You register once, validate your drivers license online and get access to a variety of services. Thus, the app makes urban mobility services easily accessible and fun to use. The partner company is an internal corporate start-up belonging to the Bosch group and is located in Ludwigsburg near Stuttgart. They are a small and agile team and provide the opportunity of working in a start-up environment while also receiving the support and opportunities of a large corporation.
  The goal of this thesis is to expand the existing app by including a routing feature. This feature should not only provide the fastest and cheapest route between two destinations but also make suitable recommendations of points of interest (POIs) for the user along the way, thus creating the "nicest" or "most interesting route". Some work suggesting algorithms to combine multiple POIs along routes already exists [1] but often these algorithms focus solely on the selection of POIs and do not consider pleasant routes with, for example, beautiful views between the single POIs. A problem that is more relevant to the topic of this thesis is the so-called Arc Orienteering Problem [2] where scores are assigned to the arcs between the recommended locations. In order to achieve the goal of this work, the student has to research similar problems and existing solutions to these problems. She or he has to come up with an own solution for generating a pleasant route for drivers and implement it in a prototype. An important part of this thesis is an evaluation where the user compares her / his own solution with a baseline such as traditional routing algorithms for combining POIs along routes. The student will receive strong support from the partner company and work closely together with its development team.
  If you are interested in this topic, please send your application (CV, transcript of records and a short motivation statement) to Daniel Herzog (herzogd[AT]in.tum.de). Requirements are a strong academic record and experience in the development of iOS or Android applications. The thesis would be paid according to Bosch compensation levels. To improve communications it would be helpful if you would be located at the partner company's office in the Stuttgart region for at least part of the thesis.
  [1] Wörndl, W., Hefele, A., & Herzog, D. (2017). Recommending a sequence of interesting places for tourist trips. Information Technology & Tourism, 17(1), 31-54.
  [2] Souffriau, W., Vansteenwegen, P., Berghe, G. V., & Van Oudheusden, D. (2011). The planning of cycle trips in the province of East Flanders. Omega, 39(2), 209-213.