For Alstom China train success comes at a price
When Patrick Kron, chief executive of Alstom, the French engineering group, signs a deal with the -Chinese ministry of railways to supply the country with 500 of the largest freight locomotives ever built, it will highlight the increasing importance of the world's most populous country for Europe's rail suppliers.
The deal - which could be signed as soon as today - is thought likely to be China's biggest single rolling stock order with one of the big three rail equipment suppliers that dominate the world market. Mr Kron has told journalists the deal will be valued at more than �1bn ($1.26bn, ￡670m).
Alstom is world number two in global rail equipment sales behind Bombardier Transportation, part of -Canada's Bombardier Group, and ahead of Germany's -Siemens.
However, the deal will also highlight a more complicated and sensitive issue - China's insistence on technology transfer. Under the deal, Alstom will set up a joint venture with Datong Electric Locomotive, a -Chinese manufacturer, to -co-operate on the order. The Chinese partner is likely to have full access to the modern technology at the heart of the locomotives' design. It will also learn, in the course of the production run, how to manufacture the vehicles.
While none will say so publicly, suppliers suspect that China will soon build far more rail vehicles without western help. There is also the possibility that China could start exporting railway equipment to the big three's core market in Europe. Chinese suppliers have started to show an interest in tenders to supply cut-price regional trains in some European markets, including the UK.
"It's no secret that the Chinese market is an extremely interesting -market from the volumes point of view," says Drewin Nieuwenhuis, general manager of Unife, the European railway suppliers' association. "The issue always is the technology transfer. The Chinese are smart people, good negotiators and they always want the technology included."
Under a typical deal, a western supplier will build the first few vehicles of a Chinese order itself, possibly in a European factory, then export the vehicles to China where they will be inspected by the Chinese manufacturer and used as a blueprint for future vehicles. The foreign partner then does less and less of the work over the construction run, with -vehicles exported in kit form for part of the run and -production sometimes moved entirely to China for the last few units.
Large trainmakers have been involved in some high-profile deals of this kind. -Siemens agreed to share its technology under the agreement to build Shanghai's Transrapid magnetic levitation rail line to the city's airport which, with a top speed of 430km per hour, is the world's fastest regular passenger rail service.
Bombardier braved protests from Tibetan independence activists to participate in the joint venture that built trains for a new rail line linking the Chinese heartland to Tibet. The trains had to be highly sophisticated to withstand mountain conditions on the route, the world's highest rail line.
Yet, however unhappy they are at handing over such sensitive designs to China, most railway suppliers feel the market is too large to ignore - particularly since their rivals are likely to accept the terms.
China is building large numbers of metros and -constructing long-distance high-speed lines that require the fast trains, which are among the European suppliers' flagship products. The country is also investing in regional passenger markets and improving its freight capabilities.
Even though it will have to share the revenue from the freight locomotive deal, Mr Kron has said the agreement will be worth several hundred million euros to Alstom.
The Chinese market is all the more significant because orders in the core European market are limited by constraints on the public budgets of eurozone countries.
David Slack, communications director for China for Bombardier Transportation, says that, while Europe still accounts for 70 per cent of Bombardier's revenues, the Asia-Pacific is the fastest-growing region.
Neil Harvey, a Bombardier executive, says the company agrees to the technology transfer because otherwise it would simply not win Chinese orders.
"The short answer to why we do it is we wouldn't get the work if we didn't do it that way," he says.
向中国卖火车的代价
法
国工程集团阿尔斯通(Alstom)的首席执行管帕特里克?克朗(Patrick Kron)将与中国铁道部签署一项供应500辆货运机车的协议，这些机车是有史以来体积最大的一批。届时，这笔交易将突显出，对欧洲铁路设备供应商来说，中国这个世界上人口最多的国家正日益重要起来。
该协议可能最早于近日签署，外界认为，它可能是中国与阿尔斯通签订的最大单一机车车辆订货合同。克朗已向记者表示，协议金额将超过10亿欧元(合12.6亿美元)。阿尔斯通是主导世界市场的三大铁路设备供应商之一。
以铁路设备的全球销售额衡量，阿尔斯通排名全球第二，位居加拿大庞巴迪集团子公司庞巴迪运输(Bombardier Transportation)之后。德国西门子(Siemens)名列第三。
然而，上述协议还将突显出一个更为复杂和敏感的问题――中国坚持要求技术转让。按照该协议，阿尔斯通将与中国机车设备制造商――大同电力机车有限责任公司(Datong Electric Locomotive)组建一家合资企业，合作完成订单交付。大同机车公司有可能获取这批机车设计的全部核心、现代技术。它还将在生产过程中学会如何制造这些机车。
尽管任何一方都不会做非常公开的表示，但供应商们猜测，中国将很快在不需要西方国家帮助的情况下，制造数量多得多的机车。此外，还存在一种可能，即中国可能会开始向三大机车制造商的欧洲核心市场出口铁路设备。一些中国供应商已开始表现出兴趣，有意参与竞标，向英国等一些欧洲市场供应廉价的区间火车。
欧洲铁路行业联盟(Unife)的总经理德雷文?尼文乌伊斯(Drewin Nieuwenhuis)表示：“从容量角度来看，中国是一个极具吸引力的市场，这早已不是什么秘密。问题始终在于技术转让。中国人很精明，善于谈判。他们总是希望将技术转让包含在合同中。”
通常协议都会规定，首先由西方供应商自己建造中国定单中的头几辆机车，可能是在欧洲的工厂进行，然后把机车出口到中国，在那里，中国制造商会对这些机车进行检查，然后将其作为以后造车的蓝本。于是，外国合作方在建造过程中的工作就会越来越少，在这个过程中，只有一个阶段是成套出口机车，有时候最后几辆的生产会完全转移到中国。
大型火车制造商已经参与过一些诸如此类的大型交易。西门子便曾同意，根据修建上海通向机场的Transrapid磁悬浮列车合同，与中方共享自己的技术。该磁悬浮列车最高速度为每小时430公里，是全球最快的常规旅客铁路服务。
庞巴迪则顶着西藏独立分子的抗议加入了一个合资企业，修建连接中国中心地带和西藏的新铁路线。这些火车的技术必须非常尖端，能经受住沿线的山地环境，这是全球地势最高的铁路线。
然而，不管在向中国移交这种敏感设计的时候多么不高兴，多数铁路供应商还是觉得，中国这个市场太大，不能忽视――考虑到竞争对手可能接受这些条款，那就更不能忽视了。
中国正在大举修建地铁，建造需要高速列车的长途高速线路，而高速列车正是欧洲供应商的主打产品。中国还在向地方性客运市场投资，并提高自己的货运能力。
尽管不得不分享这笔货运机车交易的收入，但克朗表示，对阿尔斯通而言，这份协议仍将价值几亿欧元。
由于欧元区国家公共预算的约束，主要欧洲市场的定单而受到了限制，因此中国市场现在更加重要了。
庞巴迪运输公司中国区通信主管戴维?斯莱克(David Slack)表示，欧洲仍然占庞巴迪收入的70%，而亚太是增长最快的地区。
庞巴迪一位高管尼尔?哈维(Neil Harvey)表示，公司之所以同意技术转让，是因为不然的话就不能赢得中国的定单。
他说道：“我们为什么这么做？简单地说，因为不那么做就得不到这些工作。”
