During the course of the concept phase, the subsystems belonging to a rail vehicle will be defined and optimised in order to fulfil all requirements that are stated in the customer specification sheet and the legal / official requirements placed upon the entire vehicle. In doing so, special customer needs (market requirements, service, operation, maintenance, infrastructure interfaces, climatic operating conditions, etc.) are placed at the centre of attention.

The conception phase consists of the following matters:

• Designing, itemisation, evaluation of the concepts into vehicle systems
• Itemisation of RAMS specifications and placement in the system requirements
• Establishing of a risk management as well as the systems that are to be examined with the Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA)
• Implementation of layout calculations

During the layout phase of the vehicle and the resulting construction conditions, a large amount of the later costs that will be accrued during the production and maintenance phases will be determined. The lifecycle costs that derive from the aforementioned are of great importance when evaluating vehicle concepts. The itemisation of the RAMS specifications and their insertion into the system requirements of the vehicles in order to minimise the lifecycle costs are important elements of the project.