15 February 2024:

The Right Hon. Huw Merriman MP, Minister of State for Rail and HS2 visited BCIMO, future home of Universal Signalling's light rail demonstrator on Thursday 15th February. Universal Signalling CEO Sam Bemment had a brief opportunity to update the minister on Universal Signalling's plans.

The minister joined other politicians - including Dudley North MP Marco Longhi and Dudley Council Leader Patrick Harley - riding in the Coventry Very Light Rail vehicle over infrastructure that was recently fitted with the first prototype Universal Signalling components.

Local media have reported on the visit including recording a short video of the journey in the vehicle at speeds of up to 40kph. 

The minister said he was pleased to be able to see the unique and innovative technology being tested at the centre and said he felt it would be the future of transit systems in the country. 

He said: "It's great to be here and I think it's pretty unique and innovative technology that's being deployed here and, really, it looks to be the future."

Marco Longhi added: "It's great that Huw has come to Dudley to visit what we're doing with the Very Light Rail scheme, as well as the fact that he is seeing for himself that we've got a unique track in the United Kingdom for testing not just light rail, but all sorts of other rail concepts."

Sam Bemment commented: "Sadly the minister is here just a couple of months too early to have enjoyed that vehicle ride under the supervision of Universal Signalling's full system, but we will of course be inviting him back in due course to see our technology in action at one of our demonstration days."

11 January 2024:

Universal Signalling Ltd has been successfully selected as one of a number of companies to demonstrate innovations in railway construction technology upon the new Global Centre for Rail Excellence site in Wales, under a programme supported by the Department for Business and Trade, and InnovateUK. The Global Centre of Rail Excellence is a world class facility for rail research, testing and certification of rolling stock, infrastructure and cutting-edge new technologies currently being developed in South Wales. Located on a 700-hecatre site, GCRE will become Europe’s premier site for rail and mobility innovation.

This project is funded by the Department for Business and Trade through the competition  ‘GCRE: Railway Construction Innovation Phase 2’, delivered by InnovateUK in collaboration with GCRE. All the supporting parties have a stated desire to build innovative approaches, methods and technologies into GCRE test centre right from when the very first spade hits the ground.

This win follows on from Universal Signalling's earlier successful delivery of a feasibility study as part of the 'Innovation in Railway Construction Phase 1' project.

Working alongside a number of supporting partners including Birmingham Centre for Railway Research and Education (BCRRE), Universal Signalling Ltd will deploy an overlay of it's patent-pending Universal Interlocking system to existing GCRE track by Q1 2025, in a project with a total delivered value of £793,000. 

Following announcement of the win, Sam Bemment, CEO at Universal Signalling, commented: "We should not underestimate the opportunity GCRE presents to enabling rail innovation. Firstly, through offering a place where those with novel approaches are able to test and demonstrate technology, but secondly, and most importantly, by making that opportunity available to an SME start-up such as ourselves. There was no mechanism for this to have happened even a few years ago, so clearly, GCRE is already starting to have significant impact even as it is being built. We are obviously delighted with the win and excited to be part of GCRE's journey, through the forthcoming construction phase and then on into operations."

22 December 2023:

Mark Beeson, a former Technical Director, has joined Universal Signalling as Product Director. 

Mark has over 20 years of multi-disciplinary engineering experience encompassing railway signalling, electronic engineering and software design. He has been instrumental in the conception, design and acceptance of a series of innovative and disruptive railway signalling products, managing the entire product lifecycle from cradle to grave.

Equally at home in the boardroom, with the customer or in a design meeting Mark has a reputation for placing himself at the centre of the business, allowing others to freely play to their strengths, delivering successful outcomes for all.

20 November 2023: 

Universal Signalling is proud to have become a member of the Railway Industry Association, the voice of the UK Rail supply community and the UK's premier rail trade association, with history dating back almost 150 years. 

Rose Garber, Member Relations Director at RIA, commented: 'We are excited to have such a promising export start-up adding to our ever growing membership and delighted they see value in joining RIA. I look forward to seeing them more regularly at our technical, policy and exports events to hear about their exciting developments'. 

28 September 2023:

Universal Signalling has become one of more than 100 organisations to endorse the ‘once in a generation’ Global Centre of Rail Excellence, one of the most important and creative infrastructure projects in rail today. 

'Having closely followed the development and progress of the GCRE, we firmly believe it will play a crucial role in advancing the railway and demonstrating its wider social impact, too. We are committed to supporting the development of the Global Centre of Rail Excellence and can see value to our business in the range of services it is offering.' (excerpt from support letter)

31 August 2023:

As part of a series of meetings with industry operators, maintainers, specifiers and owners, arranged to garner feedback on US's proposals, US met with Railmotive on 30 August. A number of topics were discussed with positive feedback (and a few minor tweaks!) regarding US's proposals. 

Railmotive Managing Director, Karl Watts, FCIRO, commented: 'Imagine a railway where £billions could be saved on new resignalling schemes, where changes could be made to the infrastructure at minimum cost and track based engineering activities could be made even safer. A pipe dream? Maybe not. I met up with Dr Sam Bemment and Stephen Head from Universal Signalling to learn more about their new, pioneering signalling system. Technology moves on and the architecture of this revolutionary system has the potential to significantly reduce the current, extremely lengthy design, installation, testing and assurance processes. It also has the potential to reduce the cost of new signalling schemes by up to 90%. Too good to be true? I don’t think so.'

Reassuring words! We look forwards to our upcoming demonstrator reaffirming Railmotive's belief in us.

4 August 2023:

Stephen Head MBA has joined US [Universal Signalling] as a director, bringing a wealth of operational and rail business experience. Stephen is formerly head of fleet engineering at Heathrow Express, technical director at Go-Ahead Deutshland, rail control systems expert at SNC-Lavalin/Interfleet, and an award-winning chair of the Young Rail Professionals. Stephen has operational and project management experience which will be of prime importance in the coming months, as US looks to close out it's GCRE feasibility work with the clear and unambiguous goal of winning a contract to fit a Universal Interlocking demonstrator to the new Welsh test track. 

Stephen had been providing ad-hoc operations advice and project input for a number of months prior to this this appointment. 

Stephen stated: 'I am excited beyond words to join Universal Signalling. The architecture this organisation proposes has the opportunity to clear out the cobwebs at the very heart of railway command, control and signalling in the way ETCS promised, but then failed to do. Operations will permanently change for the better on any network where it is implemented. I look forward to demonstrating our approach to the industry in the near future' .

12 June 2023:

The target date for our first in-track demonstrator is mid-2024. 

We have created an expression of interest form for those who wish to experience system operation once our minimum functionality is met. Please fill your details in this form if you would like to be offered* a place to attend one of our proposed demo days. We'll put on buffet lunch, and you will come away with a promotional rubber duck. If you're lucky, you might get to drive a rail vehicle. If not, you might get to watch us do it.

*Places are limited, first-come-first-served and subject to status. 

13 March 2023:

It has been announced that Universal Signalling's application to the 'Innovation in Railway Construction' competition has been successful. Funding will be awarded for a feasibility study on the fitment of our Universal Interlocking concept to the Global Centre of Rail Excellence . In total, 24 teams won funding, each taking a share of £566k, underwritten by the Department for Business and Trade. In delivering the study, Universal Signalling will be supported by the Birmingham Centre for Railway Research and Education (BCRRE).

Head of Rail at the Department for Business and Trade, Mike Noakes, said: 'These projects are a great platform and it will be fantastic to see the best grow into new products and technologies that can be deployed on and around the UK rail network and then globally, with benefit for passengers, operators, the wider industry and UK plc.'

22 December 2022:

Universal Signalling has been formed to exploit intellectual property under development since 2018 by SBE [SkyBlue Engineering Ltd]. SkyBlue is an engineering consultancy specialising in technology research, development and innovation for rail. Over a number of years, SBE has been developing a novel approach to railway safety: an overarching system to protect all of those interacting with the railway, with a price point and flexibility far improving on the market leading digital signalling solutions in ERTMS/ETCS and CBTC. 

Speaking at the celebration event for company formation, Dr Sam Bemment, award winning co-founder, said: 'Digital signalling is clearly the future. There are few in the industry who doubt that. There are a range of digital solutions you can buy off the shelf, like ETCS. Unfortunately, those systems were specified in the era of the Nokia 3310, and the simple truth is that the world has moved on. Safety technology does not have to be the latest and greatest, but other solutions are hamstrung to technology which is obsolete before it is even fitted. Over the coming months, I look forward to Universal Signalling demonstrating a real-world alternative that will open the eyes of railway professionals to what can be achieved when we flip the architecture on it's head, whilst using existing hardware.'