DEFINING INNOVATION
Innovation Library
When a company joins the Rail Innovation Group, we ask them one thing: tell us what innovation means to you.
We ask because we don't think innovation has a single definition, and we don't think a membership body should impose one.
The companies we work with are closest to the problems rail needs to solve. Their view of what innovation is, and what it is for, is the view that should guide us.
Every definition here has shaped how we assess ideas, what we look for in new members, and what we advocate for with the sector and government.
What the definitions tell us
Read together, a few things stand out.
For most of our members, innovation means solving real problems in ways that work in the real world. The words that come up again and again are practical, useable, deployable, trusted, applied. Novelty for its own sake barely features.
Many frame innovation as an ongoing process. They talk about execution, persistence, and learning through failure as much as the original idea.
Several point to the end-user. Innovation, for them, is measured by the outcome for the people who use the result, whether that is a passenger, an operator, or a colleague.
Taken together, these definitions describe a community that is pragmatic, outcome-focused, and impatient with hype. That tells you a lot about who we are.
From definitions to recognition
These definitions do more than mark our heritage. We have drawn on them to build a single working definition of innovation, shaped by our members themselves. That definition underpins our Recognised Innovation Scheme, which recognises suppliers and individuals whose work reflects it.
Because the definition is peer-generated, recognition under the scheme carries the weight of an industry-wide endorsement.
What a decade has taught us
In 2026, to mark our tenth anniversary, we asked our members how innovation in rail had changed over the ten years since we formed. The headline finding was simple: the sector is not short of innovation, it is short of pathways to adoption.
That sits closely alongside these definitions.
Year after year, our members have defined innovation in terms of application, deployment, and real-world value, rarely in terms of novelty for its own sake. They have always understood that an idea only counts once it is in use.
The research showed why that matters. Most members can develop a credible solution, run a successful trial, and prove its value. Progress stalls at the step from trial to adoption, what the report calls the "missing middle". The quality of the idea is rarely the problem. The structure of the system around it is what holds things back.
The definitions and the research tell the same story from two angles. Our members have always defined innovation as something that has to be adopted to mean anything. Over the decade the sector has grown more open to that idea, though the structural pathways to adoption have been slower to follow.
THE DEFINITIONS
Add your own definition..
Every member contributes their definition of innovation when they join. If you'd like yours to appear here, become a member.
Transporting Cities:
“Innovation does not need to be a product, it is the introduction of new ways of thinking within a traditionally process-driven industry.”
JPL Diversified:
"Product Innovation is the process of transforming an idea or invention into a successful commodity in its target market. Business Innovation is taking a new idea and using it to embed real change."
CrossTech:
"Innovation to us is simply the label given to the end of the process of creating successful change. What's more important is the road taken to achieve that outcome. This road is about failing, persevering and quickly learning through challenges. For teams who get past this and make it, success is codified as innovation. Hence, innovation is about execution."
Tekmon:
"Innovation leads to novel ways of living and working that, once adopted, become indispensable and hard to imagine life without."
DataWharf:
"We believe that successful innovation is focused on the end-user and outcomes for people. Whether it's new products, ideas or technological inventions, innovation should ultimately aim to simplify lives, provide new opportunities and empower potential."
One Big Circle:
"Innovation is about being smart without just trying to be clever. It's about taking time to understand the problems that really need solving and then finding the best way to build a solution. An innovative solution can be built on and with systems & technology already available in place - it's not just about the shiny and new and it has to work in the real world."
Predge:
"Innovation is to continuously identify new ways to improve and generate more business value by combining state of the art technologies with real life business conditions."
PiPcall:
"Innovation means removing complexity from critical communications - enabling rail teams to meet regulatory, safety and operational needs with simple, scalable technology that fits the way they already work."
Next Gen Engineers Force:
"Innovation is the process of transforming creative ideas into practical solutions that deliver value by improving existing systems, creating new products or services, or advancing sustainable practices through novel approaches."
TreeStock:
"Innovation to TreeStock means solving challenges, but a solution only counts when it is useable, deployable and trusted by the people whose work depends on it."
Open Train Times:
"Innovation is the art of taking your knowledge in one sector and applying it in another sector to make a process or technology better and more effective."
Scheidt & Bachmann:
"To increase the passenger experience using technology seamlessly without exposing the challenges in today’s travelling society."
PassageWay:
"Innovation is the art of seeing a better outcome. From re-imagining an existing product, service or experience to pure blue-sky thinking, innovation is the risk that entrepreneurs, inventors and others take to step forward."
True North Rail:
"Innovation is imagining how something can be improved and taking action to bring about the change."
RASIC:
“Innovation is the application of a novel system, process or technology into a specific product, sector or industry.”
Window Seater:
"Innovation is creating something unique and of applied value that hasn't been seen in the industry before"
Yurtle:
"Doing something differently or better - Yurtle innovates not just through technology, but by redefining how care responsibilities are supported in modern workforces, practically, emotionally, and financially."
ThinkinCircles:
"Enhancing talent attraction, generating client leads, and driving business growth, all while conserving time, money, and resources."
Centre for Teams:
"An idea has to be 'Meaningfully Unique': attractive and meaningful to you, your organisation, your customers; and sufficiently 'new & different' - even if that is just in your department, organisation, or sector..."