Novel electronic key exchange system preserves social distancing

Arne Eivind Andersen, CEO Sharebox, in front of the new insurance approved key exchange cabinet installed at a Skoda/Nissan dealer in Norway.

A Norwegian key exchange system originally developed for the sharing economy is now being pitched as a solution for auto repair shops during the current pandemic.

The unique system allows keys to be securely dropped off and picked up at repair shops without any physical contact.

Entrepreneur Arne Eivind Andersen, founder and CEO of Sharebox, says his latest product, the S-18 Safe ServiceStation, was generating a lot of interest from repair facilities even before Covid-19 raised social distancing concerns.

“The COVID-19 situation has dramatically boosted the interest for our new S18-Safe cabinet, especially because it allows employees to fix the cars without ever having physical contact the clients,” he said.

The S-18 is an offshoot of Andersen’s original Sharebox system, developed in 2016 for the property and vehicle sharing industry.

Already popular throughout Europe, Sharebox products are now being marketed in North America.

Andersen says the appeal of the S-18 cabinet, beside preventing physical contact, is the built-in software that handles a variety of routine functions common at repair shops.

“The new S18-Safe Service Station has more features than just exchanging keys,” he said. “The real value in the cabinet is embedded in the software, where integrations with external systems that are being used in the car industry, such as payment and booking systems, all come together.”

The S18-Safe ServiceStation is developed in a collaboration between Sharebox, Mekonomen Group, and Innovation Norway and has already been installed at a number of car repair shops.

“Now we are looking forward to help even more repair shops in the rest of Scandinavia in the following months. We are actually ready for delivery world-wide,” he said.

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