INNOTRANS: Ahead of the opening of the InnoTrans trade fair in Berlin, Siemens Mobility launched the latest iteration of digitalisation programme on September 23, branded Signaling X.
Signaling X is intended to allow multiple signalling, train control and related IT systems to sit in a single cloud-based data centre, offering the potential for urban and main line train control systems to be managed through a single IT architecture. According to Siemens Mobility, this will offer railways, infrastructure managers and potentially metro operators significant efficiency savings by enabling them to migrate away from individual servers, legacy IT systems and siloed working practices.
The company is offering a Centralised Signalling Data Centre, powered by standard hardware. This approach enables the management of both safety-critical and non-safety critical Siemens Mobility applications through standardised APIs, opening interfaces to diagnostic and optimisation systems, such as train planning tools, in one cloud environment.
Signaling X utilises the DS3, the Distributed Smart Safe System introduced by Siemens Mobility in 2020. The scalable DS3 safety platform is the foundational base of Signaling X, as it allows safety-relevant applications to run in a cybersecure environment in the cloud, as well as offering georedundancy advantages. DS3 has been successfully deployed in an ‘interlocking in the cloud’ at Achau in Austria and in shadow mode around Barcelona, both as part of ETCS roll-outs. Siemens also has a contract to deploy the technology in Finland, where the for the first time multiple applications will be covered, in addition to ETCS.
‘With Signaling X, we are centralising all rail infrastructure data from long-distance, inter-city and urban traffic into one cloud-based, hardware-independent signalling data centre’, said Andre Rodenbeck, CEO of Rail Infrastructure at Siemens Mobility. ‘Customers can expect a substantial increase of their operational efficiency with reduced installation expenses, consolidation of operating locations, and through streamlined maintenance activities.’
As a precursor to the full roll-out, Rodenbeck told Railway Gazette that in Hamburg, Siemens Mobility was already seeking to manage data from DB InfraGO, S-Bahn Hamburg and Hamburger Hochbahn through a single cloud-based architecture. He also said that Signaling X would not incorporate signalling equipment supplied by its competitors.
