Emerging Trends in Railway Component Manufacturing

Magazine

Vishal Pratap Singh

As the population is increasing at a very high rate, the local transportation demand is also increasing. Governments across the globe are investing huge amounts to strengthen their railway networks across their respective countries. Therefore, this is expected to boost the railway components market. The railway components market was valued at USD 78 billion in 2020 and is expected to reach USD 95 billion by 2026, registering a CAGR of more than 3 per cent during the forecast period 2021-2026.

Rail components majorly include railway tracks, railway sleepers, turnout, rail fastening systems and railway fish plates. Factors, such as the increase in investments in rail infrastructure and expansion of rail networks in densely populated regions will enable the growth of the rail components market. “The railway component manufacturing is undergoing significant changes in response to the growing demand for fast transportation between different cities”, says Vinay Kumar Tripathi, CEO, Railway Board. The government’s Make in India initiative laid particular emphasis on promoting manufacturing activities within the country.

Efficient Bogie Design

The bogie segment in the rail components market is expected to hold the largest market share during the forecast period, owing to the growing adoption of powered bogie design across the world. Thus, many locomotives, multiple units, such as high speed trains and mass transit vehicles which includes suburban trains, metro cars, light rail vehicles and tramways are equipped with powered bogies.

Rail bogies have seen investment in research and development in recent years. Companies have been focusing on creating safe and efficient bogie designs for locomotives by embedding digital devices that work on the principle of the Internet of Things (IoT).

Adoption of Automation Technologies

Advancement of technology has been boosting the growth of every market in the last two decades. The demand for safety, comfort and time management has immensely increased, which can be fulfilled by innovations of manufacturing companies.

The variation of rail components has shown better output results and has attracted new customers as well. In addition, huge investments made by manufacturing companies in research and development are expected to fuel the rail components market.

Modern railway mobile communications systems, enhanced with 5G technologies, allow for low-latency communications and high performance, as well as the reliability of railway infrastructure. Further, communications based train control (CBTC) enables efficient rail traffic management and asset monitoring. Train connectivity applications span train positioning, control, maintenance, passenger experiences and passenger data collection. For example a British startup named Tethir develops optoelectronic ground-to-vehicle devices for train and autonomous vehicle connectivity. The startup’s devices provide high bandwidth capabilities at low power demand. The devices, powered by solar batteries create a wide field of views for better connectivity.

Big Data & Analytics

The use of big data in the railway sector paves the way for train communication, predict analytics, asset management, passenger information systems and data management platforms. By deploying smart railway sensors, millions of data points are gathered and analysed to further improve the safety, security and reliability of rail infrastructure. The ability to predict failures further allows rail operators to plan repairs, increasing the availability of rail. Startups and scaleups are developing IoT sensors to collect data for almost every facet of rail infrastructure, including railcars, tracks and signalling units.

Increased Focus on Digitalisation

Digitalisation has emerged as the key factor for innovation in the railways. It provides significant opportunities to streamline operations, improve reliability of assets and enhance passenger experience while reducing costs. It is being used to derive real time information on rail movements and is an enabler of predictive maintenance for fixed assets and rolling stock.

Rail Fastening System

Rail Fastening System refers to a group of railway fasteners that are used to fasten steel rail to railway sleeper. The main function of rail fastening system is preventing steel rail from lateral and horizontal movement. Besides that, industry experts are focusing to manufacture rail fastening systems that can absorb and transfer the pressure from locomotive to railway sleeper. In a word, rail fastening system ensures the rail in gauge and protects rail safety. Rail fastening system has a lot of types that is composed of different fasteners.

The Way Forward

The outbreak of COVID-19 acted as a massive restraint on the rail components market as supply chains were disrupted due to trade restrictions and consumption declined due to lockdowns imposed by government. However, the market is expected to regain its growth as government is going to introduce many new projects to boost the production of new bogies and necessary rail components. In Asia-Pacific, India is one of the largest and fastest growing markets for railway components. India is planning to make investments in rolling stock to upgrade its rail transportation system. Increase in developments of metro projects and expansion of electrified network rail routes will further create opportunities for OEMs to expand their revenue stream and increase their geographical presence.