GBASE Database Supports the Deployment of Independently Developed Data Systems in Urban Rail Transit

GBase 8s is China's first domestically developed database system that matches world-class technology, capable of efficiently processing tables with hundreds of millions of rows. Its high-availability solution, based on a shared-storage database cluster architecture, automatically switches nodes when failures occur, ensuring system stability and continuity. The localized services provided by GBase 8s represent a unique advantage that other commercial and open-source databases cannot match—delivering rapid, optimal database-layer solutions that directly respond to user needs. With high replaceability, high stability, high availability, and high controllability, it can be widely deployed across both management and transaction-oriented applications, enriching standards for foundational technology architecture and offering greater flexibility to users and integrators.

GBase has broken the long-standing monopoly of Oracle and DB2 in the rail transit industry, and its presence is now established in transportation, railway, and other sectors. Its technical maturity, industry leadership, and deepening commercialization have laid a solid foundation for market rollout and large-scale adoption.

1. Automatic Fare Collection System

The metro AFC (Automatic Fare Collection) system is an automated solution that leverages computer, communication, network, and automatic control technologies to handle ticketing, gate control, billing, revenue collection, statistics, clearing, and management processes.  
Driven by the requirement for technology localization, the metro AFC system selected a domestic database to replace its original Oracle-based setup. The system uses a shared-storage database cluster powered by GBase 8s to coordinate with AFC application software at each station and line management center. It is currently the only Chinese database vendor for AFC systems in the rail transit industry.

2. Integrated Supervisory Control System 
 

The Integrated Supervisory Control System (ISCS) adopts a unified operating platform and integrated monitoring mechanism to achieve unified management of various basic data. It consists of a central-level ISCS, station-level ISCS, and other auxiliary function subsystems. It typically integrates the Access Control System (ACS), Fire Alarm System (FAS), Power Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (PSCADA), Platform Screen Doors (PSD), Building Automation System (BAS), Electrical Fire Monitoring System, and Flood Gate System (FG), among others.

Using a GBase 8s database to build a shared-storage database cluster ensures the stability and high availability of data servers at stations and line centers. The system runs stably with no production issues affecting business operations. It is currently the only Chinese database vendor for ISCS in the rail transit industry.

3. Line Network Command Center System

The Line Network Command Center is a crucial link between upper and lower levels of metro management and control. It connects the control centers of all lines in the network, monitors the overall operational status in real time, and interfaces with the transportation management systems of higher government authorities, submitting relevant data to assist their work. The data center is the core of the Line Network Command Center, storing production and business data from all lines in the network.

The Line Network Command Center integrates existing business and data resources, uniformly manages critical business data, centralizes extraction and storage, and establishes a business data center for the metro line network system. It consolidates real-time information, periodic information, and video information to provide unified management and access control.

For the complex data requirements of the Line Network Command Center, integration vendors typically adopt a hybrid data platform solution combining relational databases, analytical databases, and Hadoop big data. Currently, a shared-storage database cluster built on GBase 8s has been selected, while the GBase 8a analytical database is undergoing evaluation.

China is currently in a boom period of rail transit construction, and has become the world's largest urban rail transit market, forming a massive industrial chain. According to statistics, there are 40 cities with rail transit under construction in China, and nearly 60 cities are engaged in preliminary work such as urban rail transit planning, design, and related survey and consulting. With the ever-growing demand for rail transit construction across cities, China's urban rail transit mileage has grown rapidly, which also provides vast room for growth in the urban rail transit operation and maintenance service market.

Among these, the electromechanical systems encompass many specialized areas, such as Automatic Fare Collection (AFC) systems, Integrated Supervisory Control Systems (ISCS), Line Network Command Systems, Signal & Communication systems, etc. The databases used in these systems had long been dominated by Oracle and DB2. Starting from December 2017, the AFC system of a Chongqing Metro line, powered by the GBase 8s database, went live, marking the debut of a China-made database in the rail transit sector. In June 2019, a Hangzhou Metro line went live using GBase 8s as the primary database for its ISCS.

To date, GBase databases power AFC systems on more than a dozen lines, ISCS on nearly ten lines, and the Line Network Center system of one city. Meanwhile, our company actively participated in drafting the 2020 group standard "Technical Standard for Urban Rail Transit Automatic Fare Collection Systems" for AFC systems, and has established good cooperation with multiple metro system integrators across several other specialized areas.