Lyon is the second city in France and its public transport systems takes care of 200 millions trips per year. The means of transport are tailored to the various needs of the city traffic: a subway, a tramway, buses, trolley buses and a funicular.

The fare collection system is of the open type: all entries are controlled and exits are free(uncontrolled). The system uses the combination of two technologies: contact-less smart cards and high coercitivity magnetic tickets in Edmonson format to cover the various types of tickets at the best possible cost. For the passenger, either with a magnetic ticket or a contact-less card, the entry into the network is the same: ticket or card validation. All vehicles entries are fitted with at least one validator while the subway platforms are equipped with automatic barriers.

The fare structure is a flat fare: no distance traveled parameter in the the fare calculation. The access rule to the network is very simple: "validate each time on entry", this applies also when you transfer from one mean of transportation to another on the same trip. Also, this simplicity provides very easy inspection: just the date and time have to be checked.

The previous system, based on paper ticket, was not providing an efficient control on entry and the fraud level had reached 20%. A quick math with the yearly number of trips give an idea of the profit lost for the network.