When talking through the Doctor the Cyber-planner uses the phrases "fantastic" and "allons-y", catchphrases of the Ninth and Tenth Doctor's respectively
Steven Moffat stated that the Cybermen were redesigned because they did so often in the classic series, and yet had been consistent in the new series.
Warwick Davis stated that it was a "thrill" to be in Doctor Who (2005), especially in an episode with the Cybermen written by Neil Gaiman.
Neil Gaiman was motivated to provide a "rationalisation" for the Cybermen in current Doctor Who (2005) continuity. The classic series had depicted the Cybermen as alien cyborgs, while the revived series depicted them as human cyborgs from a parallel Earth; Gaiman opined that his Cybermen stemmed from an encounter and amalgamation of these two types of Cybermen following The Next Doctor (2008).
The three Cybermen seen at the start were the Cybus Industries models from Pete's World.