TCS secures contract to develop UK's rail data marketplace

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) on Wednesday announced that it has secured a contract with Rail Delivery Group (RDG) to design, develop, implement, and operate the United Kingdom’s rail data marketplace.

The tenure of the contract is for a term of six years including an extension term opportunity.

The digital marketplace will bring together fragmented sources of rail data into one digital service, to accelerate innovation in the transport sector and enhance the passenger experience. It was first announced in 2021 by the UK Rail Minister, Chris Heaton-Harris, as part of his plan to stimulate collaboration between the government and industry to accelerate innovation and deliver new products and services to enhance passenger experience and the effective movement of freight.

The marketplace will offer tools and frameworks to improve the sharing of data and real-time information to passengers across the UK. It will simplify data sharing across operational bodies, including the UK’s rail and non-rail transportation and the mobility network. The platform will also increase access to data for public and private bodies, improving transparency and facilitating a UK-wide railway innovation ecosystem.

“In winning a challenging competitive tender TCS was able to demonstrate its capability to support the innovative launch of the Rail Data Marketplace. This brand-new service will build on the capability created in TCS's Dexam product supported by Google's integration tools. It will offer access to new data sources as well as present existing data in more accessible formats to help businesses use rail open data to speed change, reduce costs and create new value for customers,” said Simon Moorhead, CIO & Member of the Board, Rail Delivery Group.

In the development of the RDM, TCS will leverage TCS Dexam™, a controlled data exchange environment for enterprises and their ecosystem partners. Additionally, it will use Google’s Apigee platform to develop and securely manage the APIs that partner applications will use to connect with the RDM.

Amit Kapur, Country Head, TCS UK, and Ireland, said: “We are delighted to lead this strategic program with the Rail Delivery Group. Built on TCS Dexam, the Rail Data Marketplace can not only provide data relating to the rail industry but could also present adjacent data sources important to passengers and operators and help deliver an improved experience for users. In addition, the platform will have the ability to track environmental parameters, which will allow it to support the UK’s rail decarbonisation agenda.’’