The businesses will benefit from a bespoke 20-week programme of business support designed to help them develop innovative software solutions – technology ultimately intended to help streamline delivery of major infrastructure.
This includes automation of construction site handover, speeding up design, and strengthening the role of the circular economy during site decommissioning.
HS2 Ltd’s Innovation Accelerator programme is a partnership with the Connected Places Catapult.
SMEs BuildPrompt, Document Crunch and Morta will use their time in the Accelerator to develop handover technologies that efficiently and accurately verify as-built assets to approved designs. They will also automate the currently manual process of document review and approval by harnessing machine learning algorithms to capture and interpret diverse unstructured datasets, including drawings and handwritten documents.
Madaster will develop technologies to enhance the circular economy during site decommissioning through creation of a ‘material passport’ that captures the potential value of reuse elsewhere.
Simalytica and Xinaps will specialise in speeding up design through, for example, harnessing artificial intelligence to optimise design, and automate design generation assessment.
HS2 senior innovation manager Jon Kelly said through the Accelerator programme, HS2 was “maintaining the flow of new ideas and technology into delivering high speed rail in the UK as it transitions from civil engineering works to rail systems”.
“Future application of technologies developed on HS2 have the potential to drive efficiencies across the construction and rail industries,” he said.
After development in the programme, the firms’ solutions will be showcased and pitched to industry investors and HS2’s supply chain.
Since its launch in September 2020, the HS2 Innovation Accelerator has supported 31 small businesses through five earlier cohorts that have collectively secured 24 pilot projects across HS2. These businesses have raised over £220m in investment and funding, and more than doubled their team headcount.
Applications are now open for the Accelerator’s seventh round.
