Railways

Challenge

Transportation on rails is the most effective form of land transportation for both goods and passengers, which makes it a welcomed solution to many societies in their search for the most environmental solutions. The increase in demand puts a lot of pressure on the existing infrastructure that is not only limited in already laid tracks, tunnels, and bridges, but also built to one of the highest standards in safety. It isn’t trivial to find qualified personnel for drivers in trains, metros, and trams.

New digital solutions are being sought to address this by automating the operations and to move as much of the intelligence from the trackside to onboard the train. Both developments would allow for a lower cost of replacing or laying new track, and increased capacity on the existing track as more trains can be driven with higher speeds closer to each other. In Europe these developments are codified in the development of the European Rail Traffic Management System (ERTMS) and most relevantly for Goodmill with a new 5G-based Future Railway Mobile Communications System (FRMCS). The challenges are very similar for metros and trams.

Solution

Goodmill’s multichannel routers implement the key functionality of FRMCS already today, while the whole FRMCS standard is still under development. Our routers seamlessly combine several networks into a single highly resilient logical connection on a level that enables the rail industry to even look for solutions without dedicated 5G networks. In addition to these existing commercial cellular networks on 3G, 4G and 5G technologies, the solution can include private cellular networks, traditional satellite networks and upcoming Low Earth Orbit (LEO) networks or even any other technology as long as it supports IP-trafficking.

This level of connectivity supports first the ability to transfer trackside equipment functions such as train positioning to be handled on board, but it also enables driving the train remotely and even autonomous operations in areas, such as private tracks, where regulation allows this. The ability to join networks also for their throughput allows the solution to be used also for applications such as passenger WiFi.

Key Benefits

Start experimentation and implementation of FRMCS level solutions today
Build remote-driving and autonomous operations
Ensure connectivity for passengers, train operator’s business solutions, and IoT solutions with critical level technology.
Avoid massive investments into country-wide dedicated 5G networks