DB Cargo AG, Europe’s leading rail-freight carrier, has commissioned Siemens Mobility to digitalise a large part of its freight-car fleet.

A total of 30,000 cars will be equipped with the CTmobile freight sensor solution over a period of three years.

Siemens Mobility (www.siemens.com) will operate the system for six years, monitoring data acquisition and data flows through its central in-house CT server.

The contract includes an option to equip up to 50,000 freight cars.

DB Cargo’s Steffen Bobsien said: “In an increasingly digitalised world, customers expect a high level of service. They also want to know where their freight is, when it will arrive at its destination, and its condition.”

In 2017, DB Cargo announced that its entire fleet will be equipped with new sensors and telematic systems by 2020.

The CTmobile system will give DB Cargo information about its freight cars and trains in real time and can pass it on to control centres, maintenance personnel and train operators to ensure efficient logistics and route planning.

By continuously monitoring the cars, CTmobile not only helps to detect theft, damage and accidents but also provides high-quality transport documents.

Moreover, by tracking the freight cars via GPS, their time of arrival can be predicted.

In addition, data collected by the smart sensors can provide information about the condition of a car’s load, as well as its temperature and humidity.

Data from all device-equipped freight cars is collected in a central server and conveyed via a standardised transmission interface to the customer, where it is supplemented and processed with further information from the customer’s business systems.