Alstom Projects India Ltd, a subsidiary of French-based engineering major Alstom and the public sector enterprise BEML are in final rounds to bag an order worth around Rs 1,050 crore from Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Ltd (BMRCL), sources with BMRCL said.
Earlier BMRCL has short-listed four firms – Siemens AG of Germany, Bombardier Transportation GmbH, Alstom Projects and BEML?to design, manufacture and supply passenger rolling stocks (coaches) for BMRCL.
Of the short-listed firms, ?BEML and Alstom have submitted their final bids while Siemens and Bombardier have not responded?, a senior official of BMRCL told FE. Currently BMRCL is in the process of technical evaluation and would finalise the successful bidder to supply rolling stocks in the next two-three months, the official added.
Of the two finalists, BEML is a defense equipment and coach maker and has license technology to make coaches from Korea-based Rotem. BEML has its manufacturing unit in Bangalore itself and already has orders to supply coaches to Delhi Metro while Alstom has 18% market share in rail transportation worldwide. Alstom claims that its engineers built the fastest train and the highest capacity automated metro in the world.
A top-rung official in Alstom Projects, requesting anonymity, said the company did not have rolling stock manufacturing unit in India but it has aggressive plans in capturing sizeable market share in the Indian transport sector. Recently Alstom Transport-led consortium has bagged the contract worth Rs 255 crore from the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) to design, manufacture, supply, installation and commissioning of train control and signaling system for DMRC. Some of the safety aspects BMRCL sticking on for rolling stocks including automatic train protection (ATP) facility for protection to train with driver supervision and Automatic start, acceleration and deceleration. Other required features include surveillance cameras voice communication between passenger and driver.