On Friday March 27th, 40 of the best developers, designers and entrepreneurial brains from across Europe will climb aboard HackTrain – Europe’s first train travel-focused hackathon – for a unique and inspiring three-day journey,  powered by Bloomberg.

Departing from London’s King’s Cross on Friday 27 March, HackTrain will travel through four major UK cities home to tech clusters, transport hubs, co-working spaces and market makers in the startup ecosystem.

At the first stop in London, leading rail executives will present on the key challenges facing their businesses and the UK’s growing number of rail passengers, who made 1.6 billion journeys last year alone. Contestants will then form ten teams which will compete to conceive, design and create disruptive solutions for the UK’s railway industry over a 56-hour journey, all at 200km/h (125mph).

Bloomberg’s support for HackTrain builds on the success of last year’s StartupBus competition as we continue to bring new and engaging challenges to the Europe’s thriving startup community, and to foster greater innovation in the UK.

During the ride, the train hackers will have access to the Bloomberg API, a valuable, freely available interface that allows software developers to create applications that require the consumption of financial market data.

Mentors from the Bloomberg R&D team – Jakub Misiorny and Radu Patulescu – will be with the contestants every step of the way, sharing their practical expertise, keeping motivation high and helping each team transform ideas into business propositions as they progress towards the last stop on the HackTrain line: the grand finale at the National Railway Museum in York.

There, Bloomberg London R&D’s Head of Software Infrastructure Paul Williams will join a panel of influential judges to hear final pitches and crown the HackTrain champions for 2015.

Follow hacking the rails at: http://www.bloomberg.com/rd/hacktrain/