Huawei and Passenger Railway Agency of South Africa (Prasa) have jointly announced the first rail operational Global System for Mobile Communications-Railway (GSM-R) network.<\/p>\n
The GSM-R system is a digital train to ground communication system following the international wireless GSM standard and EIRENE specifications for railway communication and applications.<\/p>\n
The GSM-R system is used for operational voice and mission critical data communication between train and control centres.<\/p>\n
It is considered as the standard in railway communication and is widely used across the world.<\/p>\n
Huawei was awarded the contract to supply Prasa with a digital wireless communication system for its commuter railways in 2013.<\/p>\n
Huawei has since deployed the first GSM-R network in South Africa, which spans over 800km and 152 stations across the country.<\/p>\n
The Huawei-Alcom Consortium (HAC)\u2019s end-to-end GSM-R solution offers mission critical rail operational voice and data functions which enable train drivers, controllers, signalling engineers and crew members to perform day-to-day railway operations more efficiently and reliably.<\/p>\n
It will also provide communication services to automatic train protection systems and introduce the ability for semi-automatic train driving capacity in the network, thereby further improving reliability and safety of the rail operation.<\/p>\n