We’re proud to work on behalf of some of the biggest names in the business and this month are celebrating the renewal of our partnership with Hitachi Rail Ltd.
Following in the wake of our successful partnership with Hitachi Rail Europe, Hitachi Rail has chosen us to provide comprehensive and round-the-clock maintenance and servicing support for all their train maintenance centres around the UK.
The centres are all home to Hitachi’s Class 800 series intercity express trains and the fleets we will be serving include 65 Class 800s operating on the East Coast Mainline as well as 93 trains on the Great Western Mainline.
MTMS will be responsible for maintaining the depot facilities and equipment needed to keep the trains operating at the highest levels of excellence and reliability, including maintaining, fault-finding and repairing the carriage washing facilities, the servicing spines and fuel arms – all of which are service critical service systems for Hitachi Rail.
We’ve also committed to providing 24/7 call out support for service critical equipment and carrying out other key depot improvements, which have already included the winterisation of servicing equipment and installation of footpaths across several Hitachi Rail TMCs.
Malcolm Prentice, chairman of MTMS, said: “After three years of building our partnership with Hitachi Rail Europe, the new contract is a big vote of confidence in our people and in the MTMS way of doing things.
“It shows that we’re now a market leader in providing the kind of depot services that are vital to train fleet owners and operators in ensuring the reliability and attractiveness of services to bring back passengers as the pandemic recedes.”
Sean Denington, head of facilities of Hitachi Rail Ltd, said: “MTMS is part of the great tradition of rail businesses based in the East Midlands and we’re delighted to be working with the company to help us in delivering excellence through our train fleet to operators, passengers and the communities on the routes that we serve.”
We already operate on behalf of train operating companies at more than one third of rail depots across the UK, serving companies including First MTR South-Western Railway, Govia ThamesLink Railway, Arriva and Siemens.
This activity has also taken place alongside a dedicated growth programme which will not only enable us to expand our operations but also see us integrate MTMS into a wider organisation designed to offer train operating companies a one-stop shop service.
Set to be launched later in the year, the venture will comprise three organisations which will provide all their construction, maintenance and product needs.
Malcolm said: “Our industry is now getting ready for the Great British Railways era, which has been described as a move towards providing a more customer-centric approach to rail.
“We are already implementing this thinking to our operations by focussing on providing a quality experience for our own customers and our new organisation will be a further step in that direction.”
