AI- and AR-Powered Interactive User Support for the Next Generation of Maintenance, Repair, and Troubleshooting Operations
From the Mobility Initiative Research Programme to an ETH Spin-Off: Addressing Today’s Railway Industry Challenges
Ensuring the safety, reliability, and punctuality of future railway operations demands innovative tools that support maintenance and troubleshooting personnel in managing increasing complexity. Training staff to maintain, repair, and troubleshoot trains or other mission-critical infrastructure requires deep technical expertise and a nuanced understanding of interdependent systems. As both equipment and procedures become more sophisticated, traditional paper manuals and static data sheets fall short.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Augmented Reality (AR) offer transformative potential to assist workers in complex, high-stakes environments. The recently concluded Mobility Initiative Research Programme, IARMO project, explored precisely this opportunity - investigating how AR, combined with AI-driven behavior recognition, could enhance maintenance workflows through interactive, real-time support.
Led by Dr. Julian Wolf under the guidance of Prof. Mirko Meboldt and conducted in close collaboration with Swiss Federal Railways (SBB), the IARMO team evaluated various AR hardware solutions and support levels to determine the most suitable configurations for real-world applications. They tested the system under real operational conditions, using tasks such as coupling maintenance as benchmarks for performance. The project brought together software engineers, process experts, researchers, and field technicians to ensure practical relevance and technical robustness.
The results were clear: AR systems, especially those offering real-time feedback, significantly reduced error rates while improving both quality and efficiency.
Building on this success, the project team founded Ucentrics, an ETH-accredited spin-off, with support from the prestigious Innosuisse Startup Innovation Project grant. The company is committed to empowering frontline workers and boosting operational safety and productivity through intelligent, real-time guidance delivered via digital and AR devices.
The IARMO project revealed several key challenges that had to be overcome for broader deployment across the railway industry. external page Ucentrics is addressing each of these systematically:
- Expanding Real-Time Feedback Capabilities
Challenge: The AR systems developed during IARMO were tailored to a specific maintenance task - coupling maintenance - and required further development for general use.
Ucentrics has created a flexible framework for integrating real-time feedback into AR applications. This modular approach enables rapid adaptationacross a wide range of maintenance scenarios, making the technology broadly applicable beyond its initial use case. - Enabling Scalable Deployment
Challenge: The original system required intensive collaboration over months between developers and technical experts. For large-scale adoption, faster implementation and user autonomy are critical.
Ucentrics developed a no-code web platform that allows maintenance teams to independently digitalize and deploy their own Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs). This drastically reduces setup time and eliminates the need for specialized AR knowledge - paving the way for scalable adoption. - Seamless Operational Integration
Challenge: During testing, AR systems were used with supervisory support. For real-world applications, frontline staff must be able to operate AR tools independently, within existing IT environments.
Ucentrics offers a device-agnostic toolkit for building intuitive, self-guided AR applications that require minimal training. These apps can run on smartphones and tablets and integrate with enterprise IT systems like SAP through standard APIs, ensuring easy incorporation into daily workflows.
Conclusion
The IARMO project delivered valuable insights into the application of AR in real-world, high-reliability maintenance contexts. It also laid the groundwork for the development of scalable, context-aware AR systems to support the Swiss railway industry’s transition into more digital, efficient, and safer operations.
