HIMA
HIMA Group is a German family-owned provider of safety-related automation systems, headquartered in Brühl near Mannheim and supplying safety controllers certified to Safety Integrity Level (SIL) 4 under CENELEC standards for the railway industry.
The company was founded in 1908 and remains family-owned. HIMA Group employs around 1,100 people across 22 group companies worldwide, according to the company.
Products for rail
HIMA’s rail offering is built on commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) safety controllers, principally the modular HIMax and the compact HIMatrix. Both carry CENELEC SIL 4 approval and meet the shock and vibration requirements of EN 61373.
The controllers originate in the process industry, where they run in large installed volumes. In rail, the same standard components are configured for applications such as electronic interlockings, level crossings, depot control and onboard safety functions.
This positions HIMA within SIL-certified safety systems as a platform supplier: system integrators, vehicle builders and operators implement their own safety applications on HIMA hardware rather than buying finished signalling products.
Market position
HIMA operates regional centres in the Netherlands, the UK, Norway, Singapore, Australia, China, the United Arab Emirates and the USA. In February 2023, the group acquired the UK system integrator Sella Controls, based in Stockport, strengthening its rail business in the UK and Ireland.
HIMA’s hardware sits on the functional safety side of fire safety and noise control, alongside fire protection and acoustic products in vehicle and infrastructure equipment.
Current activity
At InnoTrans 2024 in Berlin, HIMA demonstrated a SIL 4 electronic interlocking for a fully controlled and signalled depot, based on its open safety platform.
In October 2025, HIMA and the display manufacturer Deuta-Werke jointly launched SafeHMI, a safety-related visualisation solution combining HIMA’s safety systems with Deuta’s IconTrust display technology, certified to SIL 3 under IEC 61508.
