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Case Study: Public Transport — Transaction System Optimisation for Auckland Transport

The Challenge

Auckland Transport’s HOP card system processes millions of public transport transactions — collecting, tracking, and transferring large volumes of financial data every day.
Thales, the technology provider for the HOP system, needed additional expertise to improve system performance, ensure data integrity, and support rapid development cycles.
Key priorities included:

  • Ensuring accurate real-time tracking of HOP card balances as passengers tagged on and off.
  • Supporting top-up processing and reconciliation.
  • Improving SQL Server database performance under high transaction loads.
  • Optimising API data transfers between Thales and Auckland Transport systems.
  • Strengthening automated testing to support faster, more reliable releases

The system was mission-critical — supporting Auckland’s entire public transport network — with no room for failure.

Our Solution

Dark Arts was engaged to support the ongoing development and optimisation of the HOP backend:

  • Assisted with backend development in .NET Core — supporting new feature delivery.
  • Provided expert tuning and optimisation of SQL Server 2016 databases — improving performance and reliability under peak loads.
  • Diagnosed and resolved key SQL Server admin issues — improving stability and maintainability
  • Assisted with improvements to the API that transfers critical transaction data from Thales systems to Auckland Transport — ensuring accurate, reliable data exchange.
  • Strengthened the CI/CD process by adding targeted unit tests — helping ensure quality and reliability in each release.

The work delivered key improvements in system performance and operational robustness — helping the HOP system handle ever-increasing volumes of public transport transactions.

The Impact

  • Improved backend performance and scalability — ensuring smooth operation across Auckland’s transport network.
  • More reliable data transfers — improving reconciliation and reporting accuracy.
  • Better automated testing and CI/CD — supporting faster, safer release cycles.
  • Helped ensure secure, real-time handling of substantial public transport revenues.

The HOP card platform remains a critical part of Auckland’s public transport ecosystem — and Dark Arts’ contributions helped strengthen the performance and resilience of this essential financial infrastructure.

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