04.06.10
Two new plants for Stadler Rail Group
Today Stadler Rail Group will formally inaugurate two new plants in Altenrhein and in Oberwinterthur. Peter Spuhler, owner and CEO of Stadler Rail Group will open the new Centre of Competence for double-decker multiple-unit trains, in the presence of the President of the Confederation, Doris Leuthard, and many other representatives from the fields of politics and economics. At the same time, the company will celebrate the roll-out of the first double-decker multiple-unit train (DOSTO) for the Zurich commuter railway system. This means that following the signing of the contract in August 2008, it has taken Stadler Rail Group just 21 months to develop, design and build the vehicle. In Oberwinterthur Stadler Rail Group will begin operations at its new Centre of Competence for bogies. The levels of investment at both sites amounted to CHF 60 m. Added together with the extension work and new construction work in Bussnang and Erlen, Stadler Rail is investing a total of over CHF 100 m in Switzerland as an industrial base.
Double-decker multiple-unit trains from Altenrhein
On 31 August 2008 Stadler Rail received the contract worth around CHF 1 billion from the Swiss Federal Railways SBB to build 50 six-part double-decker multiple-unit trains for the Zurich commuter railway system. Since then the company has received four further DOSTO contracts: The private railway operator Westbahn in Austria ordered seven trains for intercity services on the Vienna–Salzburg route, the German ODEG (Ostdeutsche Eisenbahn GmbH) have contracted Stadler to provide 16 DOSTO trains for the commuter railway system on the Berlin–Brandenburg route, while only a few weeks ago the Swiss operator BLS ordered 28 trains for the Berne commuter railway system and the SBB ordered a further 24 DOSTO trains for its regional express service. Since the launch of the DOSTO, Stalder Rail has now sold a total of 125 vehicles in both of its domestic markets of Germany and Switzerland, as well as in Austria. With the exception of the vehicles for the commuter railway system on the Berlin–Brandenburg route, which will be manufactured at Stadler’s production plant in Berlin-Pankow, the DOSTO trains will be produced at the new Centre of Competence for double-decker trains in Altenrhein.
Thanks to these contracts, Stadler Rail has been able to break into the market segment of heavy commuter railway systems and intercity transport with a top speed of 200 km/h. These contracts were the trigger for the new construction projects in Altenrhein and Oberwinterthur.
Peter Spuhler is very pleased with the two Centres of Competence: “I believe in the competitive-ness of the Swiss operations, which is why Stadler Rail was also willing – even in these times of economic difficulty – to invest over CHF 100 m“.
The plant in Altenrhein has been extended with the addition of a newly-built section, while the existing production areas have been equipped so that the double-decker trains can be built there. The new hall is 136 m long, with a width of 55 m and 65 m and a total surface area of 8,350 m2. For the specific requirements of double-decker vehicles, in addition to other machines and instal-lations, an industrial milling machine with two milling portals and measuring 40 m in length has been installed. Over 450 employees now work at the Altenrhein site after Stadler Rail took over the plant from Schindler in 1997 and has since gone on to create around 400 new jobs.
Bogies for the entire Stadler Rail Group from Winterthur
The Winterthur site has been extended and is now the Centre of Competence for bogies for the entire Stadler Rail Group. To this end, a new plant has been built in Winterthur, which will be able to produce 1,200 bogies a year. Around 210 employees work at the Winterthur site. Stadler Win-terthur has been developed from the production plant of the former company SLM (Schweize-rische Lokomotiv- und Maschinenfabrik). SLM’s manufacturing operations have continued since 1998 under the name of Sulzer Winpro AG. From 2004 onwards, Winpro has, in several stages, been taken over by Stadler Rail Group. Since 2006 the company has been present on the market under the name Stadler Winterthur AG. The new manufacturing halls have a total length of 119 m, a width of 95 m, and a surface area of 10,761 m2. On the site of Sulzer’s former premises in the city centre, the service areas for vehicles and subsystems will remain.
Stadler Rail Group
Stadler Rail, system supplier of customer-specific solutions for rail vehicle construction, has loca-tions in Switzerland (Altenrhein, Bussnang and Winterthur), in Germany (Berlin-Pankow and Vel-ten), in Poland (Siedlce), in Hungary (Budapest, Pusztaszabolcs and Szolnok), in the Czech Re-public (Prague), in Italy (Merano) and in Algeria (Algiers). The Group has a workforce of over 3,000 people around the world. The vehicles manufactured by Stadler Rail have a Swiss value-added share of 80%. Around two thirds of the vehicles manufactured in Switzerland are exported. The best-known vehicle series from Stadler Rail Group are the articulated multiple-unit trains GTW (501 trains sold), the Regio-Shuttle RS1 (442 trains sold), the FLIRT (579 trains sold), the double-decker DOSTO (125 trains sold) in the railway segment, and the Variobahn (269 trains sold) and the newly-developed Tango (122 trains sold) in the tram segment. Furthermore Stadler Rail manufactures passenger carriages and locomotives and is the world’s leading manufacturer of rack-and-pinion rail vehicles.
