Bombardier Transportation strengthens its technological leadership with new and improved centres of excellence

Bombardier is extending its leading position in global mobility by launching a series of new centres of excellence during 2011 and enhancing its existing centres for technological innovation. The opening of Bombardier’s new Centre of Excellence (CoE) for its next generation electric mobility solution BOMBARDIER PrimoveCity is the latest step in this process.

Located at the company’s engineering and manufacturing site in Mannheim, Germany, the CoE is finetuning Bombardier’s inductive e-mobility solutions to provide easy urban transportation with all modes of electric vehicles, from trams and buses to commercial vehicles and cars. With a state-of-the-art testing and development facility due to open in the autumn of 2011, the CoE will support future partnerships, projects and opportunities in the fast moving electric mobility sector. BOMBARDIER PRIMOVE technology has already been demonstrated successfully with a Bombardier low floor tram in Augsburg, Germany, and with a bus on a 125 m stretch of road in Lommel, Belgium, where tests are also due to begin with a passenger car.

The opening of the Mannheim CoE follows the successful launch of Bombardier’s new CoE for Rail Signalling Engineering, in July 2011. Located in Madrid, Spain, the new centre will house more than 200 engineers working on signalling projects for Europe and Latin America. Bombardier’s signalling CoE is already working on major projects to improve safety, drive higher capacity and reliability, shorter headways between trains and reduced maintenance costs. These projects include the installation of the advanced train protection and control solution BOMBARDIER CITYFLO 650 communication-based train control (CBTC) for four lines of the London Underground (UK) and lines 1 and 6 of Metro Madrid (Spain). Metro Madrid is part of one of the busiest networks in Europe, where the customer has already noted a 30% increase in passenger carrying capacity.

In Canada, Bombardier is building a new Product Design and Development Centre to consolidate its expertise for designing and protoyping passenger rail vehicles for the North American market. This new CoE at Bombardier in St-Bruno, Quebec, is set to open in Spring 2012. Its location in the Greater Montreal area positions Bombardier for concluding research and development partnerships with recognised institutions in the region. The passenger rail vehicles designed at the centre will be built at Bombardier’s various manufacturing facilities across North America.

“Bombardier Transportation is at the cutting edge of mobility innovation, not just in terms of our proven rail products and technologies but also in terms of the latest e-mobility solutions requiring expert research and development to shape our cities of the future,” said Josef Doppelbauer, Vice President Project Management and Chief Technical Officer, Bombardier Transportation. “In order for us to best harness the potential of our product development expertise around the world, we are committed to strengthening our network of Centres of Excellence across the company. These latest investments in our new centres will complement the expertise concentrated in our existing centres of competence, and demonstrate our dedication to continually innovate and drive changes in public transportation for the 21st century.”

A global network of excellence

Bombardier Transportation draws on an extensive infrastructure of Centres of Excellence with a proven track record. The Bombardier bogies centre in Siegen, Germany, was enhanced this year with a new wheel set centre to optimise the chain of logistics. Production is set to rise from 1,700 wheel sets in the first year of operation to 10,000 per year by 2013, an increase of 83%. Bombardier’s factories in Siegen and in Crespin, France, are CoEs for bogies, delivering the industry’s most comprehensive selection of technically sophisticated bogie solutions in the form of BOMBARDIER FLEXX bogies, which cover the entire range of rail vehicles. These products are based on more than 160 years of experience and the technical expertise of the specialist engineers who contribute to the continual strenthening of the FLEXX portfolio thanks to their innovative developments.

The manufacturing site in Crespin hosts Bombardier’s CoE for On Board Electronics to develop new information and communication technologies in use by Bombardier products such as the BOMBARDIER MOVIA metro cars for Delhi Metro in India, and the new “Toronto Rocket” metro in Canada. Bombardier’s Reliabilty CoE is also located in Crespin, where a full scale electronics test laboratory was established to conduct the homologation process for the Regio 2N trains for the French Regions. Bombardier’s CoEs for light rail vehicles are located in Vienna, Austria, and Bautzen, Germany, and its CoE for double-deck trains in Gorlitz, Germany.

The development of Bombardier locomotives is centred in three manufacturing sites: Kassel, Germany, home of the BOMBARDIER TRAXX locomotive platform; Vado Ligure, Italy, for 3 kv DC markets across Europe; and an electrical locomotives development centre in Zurich, Switzerland. Bombardier propulsion and controls centres develop the systems that comprise the highly reliable BOMBARDIER MITRAC portfolio covering traction and auxiliary converters, drives and electronics. These centres are located in Vasteras, Sweden (Medium Power Propulsion system and qualification, TCMS products units); Mannheim, Germany (Low Power Propulsion, battery, TCMS, e-mobility); Zurich (High Power Propulsion,TCMS); and Hennigsdorf, Germany (drive competence).

In addition, Bombardier Transportation has a wide network of specialist engineering centres of competence providing a company-wide engineering expert resource for the following technical areas: acoustics and vibration (Vasteras), aerodynamics and thermodynamics (Hennigsdorf), crash safety (Derby, UK), design for environment (Vasteras), electrical systems compatibility (Vasteras), product safety (Kingston, Canada), reliability availability maintainability (RAM) and lifecycle cost (Vasteras), software engineering (St. Bruno, Canada), structural mechanics (Hennigsdorf), and vehicle dynamics (Vasteras).