MGC Solutions was established in 2011, from a vision shared by business partners Chris Newton and Mark Byrne.
The two professionals, who had both already accumulated many years of experience within the railway signalling and communication fields, built the company around their values of integrity, reliability, experience, efficiency, and safety.
Though MGC Solutions started out specialising in rail signalling and communication projects, it has since expanded to become an end-to-end rail business, offering design, engineering, construction, integration, maintenance and operational services throughout Australia in railway signalling, overhead line and track services.
Over the years, MGC Solutions has grown from two to 140 employees, counting major players such as Arc Infrastructure, Rio Tinto, the Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC) and the Public Transport Authority (PTA) of Western Australia among its clients.
It has successfully delivered many high-profile projects, including the Bayswater Turnback Project, the Victoria Park-Canning Level Crossing Removal Project, the Midland Station upgrade and power upgrades to Arc Infrastructure’s signalling network in the Avon Valley.
General Manager of Operations Mark Byrne said the nature of MGC Solutions’ full-service offering allows for more integrated project management, with control over core functions ensuring quality and cost-effective outcomes.
“In all the years since we started MGC Solutions, we’ve always delivered, we’ve never been late on a job and we’ve never left a job unfinished,” he said.
“We have great relationships with our clients, and ongoing maintenance agreements with several of them, who are happy with our consistent performance.
“They trust us to manage even the most intricate projects from initial concept to final commissioning.”
Although MGC Solutions has grown over the years, it’s still fully Australian owned and locally based, with its headquarters in the Perth suburb of Canning Vale.
Byrne said this gives the team an advantage as it has an innate understanding of the Australian rail industry and the unique challenges it faces.
The team knows what it takes to successfully deliver projects in remote regions of Western Australia, faced with everything from stifling heat to supply issues.
“We do a lot of work in remote Western Australia, and there aren’t many places with harsher conditions than that,” said Byrne.
“There are sometimes long lead times for materials you need, and it can be hard to get specialised electronic components off the shelf, for example. To combat that problem, we’ve developed the ability to do a lot of development and manufacturing in-house. This allows for reduced dependency on already constrained international supply chains.
“We can also develop custom solutions when standard components aren’t suitable.”
MGC Solutions has also risen to the challenges posed by Western Australia’s poor network connectivity.
“There was no phone or internet connectivity in some areas where our client projects were underway. So, we built our own long range (LoRa) radio system which brings specific data across to where the clients have connectivity.
“We generally go from the middle of nowhere to 10 or 20 kilometres down the track, but we can bunny hop that signal for 1000 kilometres if we need to.”
With a team of ten experienced engineers in Perth, as well as many knowledgeable signalling and track managers, Byrne said MGC Solutions has a solutions-based, proactive approach to projects.
“We love clients who have issues and bottlenecks in their system because we can engineer them out,” he said.
When it comes to finding solutions, innovation is at the heart of MGC Solutions. The research and design team is developing and fine-tuning several new products – from a real-time rail stress monitoring system to a wireless level crossing.
Broken rail detector
The company is also leading the way with a next-generation rail break detection system that searches for clean breaks in railway infrastructure.
“It’s the only patented system currently on the market that looks at the voltage that is sent back to the system after finding an anomaly in infrastructure.
“It offers real-time monitoring of the track, and it varies between three to eight kilometres of track that it can look at any given time.
“Nothing else works the way this thing works.”
In the coming months, MGC Solutions will install five of these systems along one of the Metro Trains lines on the East Coast as part of a new trial.
“This network currently has axle counter sections that don’t have track circuits, which requires some form of proof that there is a rail under a train!
“At the moment they are not getting the level of protection that our rail break detector can offer.”
Rail stress monitoring
Another innovative MGC Solutions product is a real-time long stress management system. It looks at rail temperature as well as stress in the rail, sending alerts when safe thresholds are exceeded.
“It lets operators know there’s a problem, so they either need to slow the trains down or go and de-stress that section of the track,” Byrne said.
“With the movement of networks towards predictive maintenance, with most networks producing digital twins, we see this real-time information as a key component for the safe operation of these important and critical railway assets. This is a much more accurate and up-to-date use of technology than just looking at ambient and rail temperature to make critical decisions about what status the asset is in at any time and will prove invaluable in the future.”
The Metropolitan Rail Network in Western Australia has been trialling two of MGC Solutions’ rail stress monitoring systems since November 2024.
“That trial, which is coming to a close quite soon, allows us to validate in real time what benefits the system can provide to our network partners, ensuring real-time understanding of this critical asset,” Byrne said. “The network is extremely happy with what it has seen and is looking to install more of our systems.”
Wireless level crossing
One of the products MGC is most excited about is a new wireless level crossing that can be rapidly deployed. Currently this system is in an advanced conceptual stage with prototypes being assembled.
Using patented technology, the level crossing can identify if a train is coming from a distance of three kilometres.
It is able to operate existing RX5 assembles and relieves the need for installing antennas, wayside equipment etc.
“It is soon to be released, and we’re already in talks with the Railway Crossing Technical Group (RCTG) in Victoria, who are very interested in rail crossing innovation,” Byrne said.
“It truly understands the risks industry has with trains versus road users and the importance of increased safety in that area.”
What makes this product stand apart is its rapid deployment, Byrne said.
“A traditional level crossing takes between two-and-a-half and three weeks to build.
“If we need to get out to a road in the middle of nowhere and put up a system to protect the people crossing the road or the railway line, we’re able to install it in a third of that time.”
Byrne said MGC Solutions is always looking to the future and striving to improve safety, efficiency and reliability within the industry.
“Innovation is extremely important, not just because it saves our clients time and money, but for safety reasons too,” he said.
“Our products help to avoid unnecessary maintenance, reducing the need for people to physically work on the railway lines where they are in harm’s way.
“We’re very excited about what we have to offer.”
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