Scottish technology company Machines With Vision has secured a multi-million-pound, multi-year contract with Network Rail to support the location of infrastructure defects.
The company said the agreement followed a successful two-year pilot and would help it pursue the global rail maintenance market, which it estimates to be worth US$78bn.
Faster fault location
Machines With Vision uses cameras fitted beneath inspection trains to create image-based geospatial maps of railway networks. Its RailLoc system and Fault Navigator mobile app are designed to guide maintenance crews to faults with millimetre accuracy.
The company said inaccurate defect location data costs the global rail industry an estimated US$6bn a year through repeat visits and wasted crew time, while also creating a serious safety risk.
Mark Chestney, Infrastructure Monitoring Programme Manager at Network Rail, said the time needed to locate suspected defects had fallen from an average of about one hour on site to five minutes during the pilot.
“We have thousands of suspects every year, so that’s thousands of hours saved and thousands of hours of reduced exposure to slips, trips, and falls,” he said.
Chestney added that emergency speed restrictions could cost thousands of pounds a minute in some locations, making it more efficient to deploy workers to repair faults rather than find them.
Brian Whitney, Engineering Expert (Track) at Network Rail, said the technology could reduce unnecessary track exposure, improve verification work and help target maintenance resources more effectively.
International expansion
Machines With Vision chief executive and co-founder Anthony Ashbrook said the company’s combination of technology and rail-sector expertise positioned it for a market moving towards greater automation.
The company is expanding its work with national railway infrastructure operators in Europe, North America and Australasia. It has also started an external investment round to support international growth.
Ashbrook said the business expected to announce further contract wins as it accelerated its international expansion.