Trainline: A long-term engineering partnership across B2C and B2B

The Client

Trainline is Europe’s leading train and coach app. With over 30 million cumulative app downloads, it aggregates routes, prices and travel times from more than 270 rail and coach operators across 45 countries every day. Millions of passengers rely on it to find and book the right journey, and delivering that experience requires engineering teams that can scale with demand without sacrificing quality or continuity. 

The Challenge

As Trainline grew and developed its market offering, the complexity of its engineering needs increased alongside it. Building high-performing teams quickly, without losing quality, pace or cultural fit, is difficult to sustain at scale through conventional hiring alone. 

The specific demands on TXP were: 

• Expanding software engineering capacity rapidly, without the overhead and lead times of traditional recruitment. 
• Extending trusted delivery capability from B2C into the more complex B2B platform and teams. 
• Maintaining knowledge continuity and team stability as the organisation scaled. 
• Reducing the management burden associated with recruitment, onboarding and retention. 

The Solution

TXP’s involvement began with a small group of engineers embedded in Trainline’s B2C team. As delivery proved itself, trust followed and responsibility expanded. TXP took on full ownership of Trainline’s B2B platform across mobile, web and backend operations. 

A structured buddy system sits at the heart of how TXP integrates engineers into client environments. From day one, every team member is supported into the project, the platform and the culture, making onboarding faster and more consistent than traditional hiring allows. 

The impact extended beyond delivery volume. TXP engineers progressed into leadership positions within Trainline, joined the internal group responsible for technically evaluating candidates, and became part of Trainline’s OnCall production support team. The team didn’t simply grow — it matured into a core part of Trainline’s engineering organisation. 

Across the partnership, TXP has delivered: 

• Full ownership of the B2B platform across mobile, web and backend. 
• Onboarding and operating train and coach carrier integrations and third-party APIs. 
• Designing and implementing the SeatMap feature across multiple carriers. 
• Introducing a new APM tool, significantly improving monitoring and observability. 
• Restructuring ticket reimbursement processes to reduce financial losses. 
• Integrating new carriers and routes to support revenue growth. 
• Re-engineering deployment pipelines to reduce cloud infrastructure costs. 

The Benefits

Engineering capacity scaled quickly, without the cost and friction of traditional recruitment. 

• Management overhead reduced, freeing Trainline’s leadership to focus on product and strategy. 
• Engineers developed into senior and leadership roles, adding long-term organisational value beyond delivery. 
• Consistent, high-quality delivery sustained across both B2C and B2B platforms over four years. 
• Deep platform knowledge retained within the team, reducing the risk and disruption typically associated with team changes.