Bombardier brings monorail and exceeds Alstom in Brazil

Canadian company Bombardier, largest train manufacturer in the world, signed yesterday its first large contract in Brazil: will supply 54 trains – or 378 cars – for the first monorail of São Paulo, Expresso Tiradentes. The cars, signaling, and electrical systems will cost R$ 1.4 billion of the R$ 2.46 billions of the contract – the remainder is civil works.

Up till now, the largest business of the Canadian company was the repair of 156 cars for Metrô de São Paulo, for R$ 238 millions, signed in 2009. With the contract, Bombardier is still behind Spanish company CAF, which signed since 2007 orders of R$ 3.6 billions for the paulista government, totaling 101 trains – or 774 cars. Bu the Canadian exceeds French company Alstom, traditional supplier of the paulista metropolitan network, who since 2007 supplied 24 trains – or 144 cars. In figures, the order sums up to approximately R$ 600 millions.

To manufacture the monorail, Bombardier shall use its 10,000-m² facilities in Hortolândia. According to Luís Ramos, communication director of the multi-national company, the Brazilian unit shall become a Bombardier monorail competence center, that is, a possible exportation platform.

The vision of the Company is that the monorail, with costs and construction time equivalent to half those of metro, is ideal for cities with great expansion rhythm. São Paulo cannot wait eight years to have a new metro line, he says.

In the country, the company also participates of the bidding for the monorail of Manaus – currently suspended – and is interested in projects being studied for Recife, Fortaleza, and Belo Horizonte. The Company also wishes to supply more for Metrô de São Paulo, with two more monorail projects under development.

Te product supplied to São Paulo will be the monorail with the highest capacity in the world – a new project for Bombardier. The capacity of the product used in Expresso Tiradentes will be 40,000 engers/hour in each direction, being able to reach 48,000 engers/hour. The capacity of the last monorail recently supplied by Bombardier, to Saudi Arabia is 20,000 engers/hour.

The Bombardier consortium, consisting of Queiroz Galvão and OAS, has beaten the group created by Hitachi, Odebrecht, Camargo Corrêa, and Mitsubishi, which made an offer of R$ 2.98 billions. Two other consortiums were disqualified due to technical reasons.