ACTIVATING INCLUSIVE GROWTH IN RAILWAY SMES BY WORKPLACE INNOVATION

ended

Railway Industry is complex because of the high added value of the services and supplies that involves the market in itself. Different standards apply to the industry along the whole value chain, with different technical standards, making difficult the digitalization process of the railway industry due to the particularities associated to it. The main objective of RailActivation Project is to create and piloting a rail business and organisational mechanisms for the uptake of workplace innovation by SMEs from the railway sector as part of an Open Innovation ecosystem. To this end, the RailActivation project will work on the development of a new mechanisms and tools based on proven principles to anticipate the effects of the digitalisation on the railway sector and designing innovation process transformation for the EU Railway Industry from the inside out by actively reimagining the entire business around the customer, enabling employees to be the catalyst for change. In order to address this objective, the specific objectives of the project are: (i) Looking at existing tools, identify and exchange best practices, (ii) Suggest a new pilot scheme, including context based, long term mechanisms to support the uptake of workplace innovation by the SMEs, (iii) test pilot scheme, (iv) create an interregional network, (v) raise awareness and dissemination of the need for Workplace Innovation, and (vi)Workplace Innovation recommendations of the benefits of these innovations. The RailActivation will be the first business model adapted to its use in the rail industry and turn every worked into a committed worker through the uptake of workplace innovation by SMEs; thus, enabling inclusive growth in railway SMEs.