Company to strengthen its support for UIC activities and to bring its expertise in pan-European networking and interoperability through membership
Utrecht/Brussels, 05 July 2018 – International rail networking and interoperability specialist Hit Rail B.V. has gained approval to join the International Union of Railways (UIC). Membership as affiliates of the UIC is open to companies involved in the railway transport chain or whose activity is linked to railway operations. As a leading provider of telecommunications and IT services to the European railways community, Hit Rail B.V. qualifies as an affiliate member and will join with effect from 4th July 2018. The company, which is owned by 12 of Europe’s leading railway organisations, hopes to contribute with its expertise in harmonisation and interoperability solutions for the disparate communications systems across Europe.
UIC is the worldwide organisation for the promotion of rail transport at a global level and collaborative development of the railway system. It brings together some 200 members on all 5 continents, among them rail operators, infrastructure managers, railway service providers, etc. UIC maintains close cooperation links with all actors in the rail transport domain right around the world, including manufacturers, railway associations, public authorities and stakeholders in other domains and sectors whose experiences may be beneficial to rail development. The UIC’s main tasks include understanding the business needs of the rail community, developing programmes of innovation to identify solutions to those needs and preparing and publishing a series of documents known as IRS that facilitate the implementation of the innovative solutions.
Hit Rail carries out a wide range of activities on behalf of the pan-European railway community it serves, giving it great synergy with the aims of the UIC. Its core services include the Hermes VPN, a private IP network connecting more than 50 railway companies in Europe, including the UIC, RNE and Raildata. It also provides a message broker and interoperability platform named HEROS (HERmes Open Services) for freight, passengers and infrastructure applications. Hit Rail already supports the UIC in the maintenance of the UIC 917-5 leaflet and by participating as subject matter experts in UIC passenger groups. Hit Rail also has extensive cooperation with Raildata, the pan-European railway freight organisation, and participates as an observer in the European Railway Agency (ERA) groups for TSI TAF and TAP implementation.
Antonio Lopez, General Manager of Hit Rail B.V. said: “Interoperability of railways across borders and on a global level is one of the stated aims of the UIC and is also one of Hit Rail’s key objectives, through our HEROS interoperability platform and Hermes connectivity platform. We have worked with colleagues from the UIC for many years and seen many synergies. UIC representatives have spoken at our conferences, most recently the Hit Rail workshop on CyberSecurity (CyberSecurity4Rail) and we see many areas where we trust we can contribute to the UIC debate and provide valuable insight from our ICT, data communications and information security perspective. We are delighted to become affiliate members of UIC and hope to play an even more active part in the organisation’s activities in the future.”