RSSB2663 - Research and Development - Review of R&D Tools - OTH-RDT

Tender description

To ensure that maximum value to the rail industry is realised from legacy RSSB R&D investments into projects which lead to industry tools. In 2018/19 the RSSB R&D portfolio will be in a position to: • Make decisions on which tools are worth updating, upgrading and/or continuing to support and for which tools it is appropriate to cease providing support • Promote valuable tools to their target users in industry • Make decisions on whether to, and how best to, take forward potential tools in the form of models, algorithms and methods. To achieve these objectives it is expected that the following activity is required: a) Building a sound understanding of the tools and potential tools in the portfolio and their current status, this will include: (i) gathering and structuring of the relevant information and (ii) undertaking a preliminary analysis to classify the information; b) Shortlisting and prioritising the tools and potential tools to be considered in detail which will include: (i) market analysis both in term of user base and similar products and (ii) analysis to assess the nature and likely cost of the intervention required to make a tool which is usable by the target audience; c) Analysing the detail of individual opportunities to determine the most appropriate way forward including the stakeholder arrangements, business cases to make developments, enhancements, upgrades at least sustainable and, when possible and appropriate, profitable. d) Collate the range of guides, user agreements and statements of limitation that apply to the models. The scope of this tender is to deliver the outcomes related to bullet point (a) above. To achieve "Building a sound understanding of the tools and potential tools in the portfolio and their current status" the project will need to deliver an exhaustive and detailed list of all the tools and models that the R&D programme has worked on over the life of the programme. This needs to: (i) Provide a clear description of all the tools and potential tools. (ii) Structure the information gathered for each tool or potential tool based on a set of relevant characteristics to be suggested by the supplier in their proposal and, validated and agreed during the first phase of the project. Key characteristics are likely to include: the stage of development the tool is at; (if relevant) the IT platform required to run it; the target audience; any data sets utilised; similar products; and others. (iii) Trace and link to relevant material, and highlight where relevant material cannot be found (eg. the published literature suggests the creation of a tool, but it cannot be located) (iv) Capture available information on the tools and potential tools current use, including organisation, project, application.