Trenitalia UK

Trenitalia UK is a UK limited company, based in London, and a 100% subsidiary of Trenitalia. The entity operates as a parent company for all operations of the Trenitalia Group in the United Kingdom. In 2017, Trenitalia UK entered the UK market with the acquisition of the c2c franchise, and in August 2019 it won the West Coast Partnership franchise tender in a joint venture with FirstGroup. c2c, a company fully controlled by Trenitalia UK, operates services from London Fenchurch Street in the City of London to commuter towns in Greater London and South Essex with high level performance and customer satisfaction ratings.

The West Coast Partnership comprises of two parts – the Avanti West Coast and the West Coast Partnership Development. The Avanti West Coast services started operating on the 8th of December 2019 and operates intercity rail services on the West Coast Main Line. The Avanti West Coast connects London with towns and cities across England, North Wales and Scotland. Trenitalia UK has been responsible for the rebranding of the franchise i.e., the creation of a new logo, the Avanti name (symbolising progress and movement), the refurbishment of trains as well as providing better customer facilities and more sustainable services.

Trenitalia has extensive experience planning, launching and running high-speed rail services. In the West Coast Partnership Development, we are working with industry colleagues, especially at HS2 Ltd and Network Rail, to deliver high-speed services to customers over the next ten years, starting from the London to Birmingham route as the first leg of the HS2 project. It also includes acting as a Shadow Operator, responsible for the development and mobilisation of high-speed services, and as an Initial Operator when services formally commence.

Trenitalia UK is fully committed to bringing the experience it developed in Italy to the market and supporting innovative customer projects. In particular, these include new ticketing systems and digital signalling, as well as the operational experience of other companies of the FS Group. For example, based on almost 10 successful years of PICO in Italy, we developed and introduced the PICO4UK ticketing system both for c2c and Avanti. The system is integrated across all the different retailing channels – ticket machines, ticket offices as well as on the website and the app. It replaces the separate end-of-life legacy ticketing systems that still dominate the UK rail market.