Modern rail projects are complex.  They use multiple systems and need to be planned, designed, constructed, interfaced, intergrated and tested in an agreed and assured manner to commission a safe, reliable, available and maintainable system.  With the help of advanced technology, a Holistic Systems Engineering Assurance methodology can be implementaed at the beginning of a project and carried forward through the whole life cycle to ensure successfuc completion o fhte project.

This paper answers:

• What is the holistic approach in Systems engineering assurance?
• Why do we need it?
• Where does it apply?
• How do we establish it for a complex rail project? and
• Detailed implementation strategy of the Holistic framework

This paper aims to establish a well-defined Systems Engineering Assurance framework to achieve the performance levels that are important to and expected by stakeholders.