TTC Expands into the European Digital Market of Freight Wagon by Founding the Wise Wagon Company
TTC Group is currently expanding by incorporating a new segment into its railway business. In partnership with the Czech company Rail Competence Center, it has established Wise Wagon, a new company focusing on the development of technologies for digital monitoring and management of freight rail wagons. The new company will focus on the European market, where there is a growing demand on technologies that enable more efficient wagon maintenance, improved safety of operation, and a better use of operational data for the management of rail vehicle fleets.
Today, approximately 640,000 freight wagons are in operation across Europe, while most of them still have not been equipped with modern telematics or the possibility of the continuous monitoring of their technical conditions. At the same time, there is pressure for the effective management of rail wagon fleets, reduced operating costs, and higher safety operations. In particular, digitalization and the smarter use of operational data belong among those key trends that should alleviate this situation.
Wise Wagon will develop technologies that connect sensors installed directly on those freight vehicles equipped with data platforms and advanced analytics services. These solutions will enable the continuous monitoring of operational and technical parameters of freight vehicles, the detection of exceptional occurrences, as well as the use of collected data for better operational decision-making, maintenance planning, and more efficient use of the vehicles.
“Digitalization of railways is no longer limited to the infrastructure or traffic management. The data generated directly by the rolling stock is becoming increasingly important in the improvement of safety, reliability, and effectiveness of operations. For us, Wise Wagon is a natural extension of our activities in the area of railway transport, and at the same time, it is an opportunity to leverage the technological expertise and capabilities that the TTC Group has been developing for many years,” says Josef Šelepa, General Director of TTC HOLDING.
Wise Wagon has been established as a joint venture of TTC HOLDING and Rail Competence Center. TTC HOLDING owns 95% share in the new company, the remaining 5% is held by the Rail Competence Center. TTC contributes technological know-how, development capacity and investment capital to the project. The Rail Competence Center incorporates its deep knowledge of the railway sector, experience from the transport industry and strong relationships with customers across Europe.
The other companies from the TTC Group with their knowledge in hardware, communication technologies, data services, and system integration will also participate on the development of the solutions.
“Today, owners and operators of railway freight vehicles are no longer looking for individual hardware, connectivity, data services nor analytic solutions. They prefer cooperating with a single partner who can cover the entire value chain. With Wise Wagon, we would like to offer such comprehensive end-to-end solutions,” says Radek Rybáček, Managing Director of Wise Wagon.
In the upcoming period, the new company will focus on technology development and the preparation of pilot projects with costumers across the European market.
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