Press and Media

03 April 2020

TÜV SÜD issues SIL4 certification to Kyosan Electric New Core-Platform (FS-CPU) for Railway Signalling Systems

TÜV SÜD, a globally acclaimed safety and quality expert, completed the safety assessment of the new FS-CPU core platform for railway signalling systems developed by Kyosan Electric Manufacturing Co., Ltd. and issued SIL4 certification.

Railway signalling systems require high level degree of safety and reliability. "Fail-safe" is the most important and basic principle, ensuring the system enters a “safe state” in the event of failures.

For certification to be issued, proof of safety and reliability of control systems and devices commensurate with the risk needs to be furnished. SIL (Safety Integrity Level) defines the level of safety and reliability, stipulated by international standards. There are four SIL levels with SIL4 representing the highest level of safety.

TÜV SÜD completed all safety assessments* of the new core platform FS-CPU (Fail-Safe Central Processing Unit) for railway signalling systems developed by Kyosan. Furthermore, TÜV SÜD issued a SIL4 certificate and will continuously monitor the production quality of Kyosan. The certification was the result of the combined expertise of TÜV SÜD Rail GmbH and TÜV SÜD Japan Ltd.

Jürgen Apitzsch, Assessor Signalling at TÜV SÜD Japan, states that a part of the assessments was performed by the local team in Japan. “We are glad that we could contribute to this SIL4 certificate, which grants access to the global market. This new platform certified for the highest safety level will enable Kyosan to develop other safety equipment and applications up to the same level.”

Hideaki Katsuta, senior technical expert at TÜV SÜD Japan, says: “During the certification process we saw that the development of this platform, which started from scratch, was truly focused on designing basic functions that offered both future extensibility and compliance with international standards.


Image: Overview of FS-CPU developed by Kyosan




Image: SIL4 certification and award


Click here for more information about rail technology-related services: https://www.tuv-sud.jp/jp-jp/industry/rail-system-safety-testing-certification

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Press-contact: Dr Thomas Oberst