Siemens Mobility acquires Optrail to expand its Train Planning System functionalities

Siemens Mobility has completed the acquisition of Optrail S.r.l., an Italian-based technology company, that provides unique algorithms for Traffic Management Systems (TMS) based on mathematical optimization methods and operations research. The acquisition complements Siemens Mobility’s existing Train Planning System (TPS) portfolio and strengthens its position as a leading supplier of software solutions to rail customers. Optrail will remain based in Rome, Italy, and its technology will be integrated into Hacon’s existing TPS products. Hacon, a Siemens Company, is based in Hanover, Germany, and an essential part of Siemens Mobility’s software unit.

“With the acquisition of Optrail we are enhancing our digital product portfolio for timetable construction and dispatching. Combining Optrail’s mathematical approach with our existing TPS.live product we will boost the efficiency of rail operations. We facilitate significant reductions of dispatching time, minimize delays, and maximize the average speed of trains,” said Frank Gerken, COO Siemens Mobility Software and Head of Business Segment Train Planning System. “Connected with systems in higher grade of automation, e.g. Automatic Train Operation, we will be able to increase the customer value significantly by preventing conflicts in real-time.”

Optrail’s core product provides real-time conflict resolution by integrating optimization algorithms. This drives TPS beyond traditional sequential meet and pass planning towards the automated optimization of dispatching across entire rail networks. Thanks to highly efficient algorithms, necessary adjustments to operations can be processed within seconds. Optrail is already enabling a large North American rail and network operator to optimize and automate the dispatching across its complete rail network, achieving significant operating improvements.

About Siemens Mobility’s software unit
Together with its subsidiaries Hacon, Sqills, eos. uptrade, Padam Mobility and Bytemark, Siemens Mobility offers a unique and holistic ecosystem. The wide range of B2B software products supports public transport operators and infrastructure managers in optimizing and digitalizing their processes. It also contributes to an enhanced passenger experience, laying the foundation for seamless and sustainable travel. The portfolio includes train planning systems, trip planning, mobile ticketing, Mobility as a Service (MaaS), on-demand transportation and fleet management, data analytics, inventory- and reservation management.

About Optrail
Founded in 2013, Optrail S.r.l. is a highly specialized digital rail-tech company with long-standing experience in technology transfer from scientific research to the industry. Optrail’s core competency is the application of quantitative decision sciences such as Operations Research and Machine Learning to real-world problems, with a particular focus on transport and logistics. Its main application area has been the development of intelligent decision-support systems in the field of rail transport.