Voestalpine to engage in Turkish rail switch plant
26.08.2010 (11:35)
Austrian steel firm Voestalpine is teaming up with Turkish partners to build a rail switch factory, Austrian Times reports.Local media have it that the Linz-based company will cooperate with local firm Kardemir and the Turkish State Railways Administration (TCDD) to construct the facility in the central province of Cankiri.
Voestalpine has announced that around 150 people will find work at the factory scheduled to start doing business by the end of the year. The company has said the facility will be run by its new subsidiary Vademsas, adding that construction should be completed in 2012.
Voestalpine will have a 51 per cent interest in the facility, Kardemir will hold 34 per cent and TCDD 15 per cent.
Turkish newspapers quote Dieter Fritz, a Voestalpine spokesman, as saying: "Our aim is to make Cankiri a centre in the world where the best switch systems are manufactured."
Reports have it that the plan is to export 10 per cent of overall production.
Voestalpine’s earnings before interest and taxes (Ebit) in the first quarter of its 2010/2011 business year reached 203.3 million Euros after the company had suffered losses of 26.3 million Euros in the same time span of the previous business year.
Turnover improved by 22.1 per cent year on year to 2.6 billion Euros, according to a recent Voestalpine announcement.
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