Siemens Wins Indian Railways’ 1200 Electric Locomotive Contract
Siemens Ltd. with a bid of Rs. 13,177 crore has emerged as the lowest bidder to manufacture, supply and maintain 1200 electric locomotives of 9000 HP (horse power) to the Indian Railways from Dahod, Gujarat.
This contract is part of the Indian Railways’ electrification initiative to upgrade its electric locomotives from 6000HP to 9000HP to enhance hauling capabilities up to 4500 tonnes with an average speed of 75 km per hour.
The maximum speed of these locomotives will be up to 120 km per hour, and they’ll be equipped with Kavach – the Indian Railways’ indigenously designed automatic train protection (ATP) system.
The Indian Railways had invited bids for this contract in April 2022 with an estimate of approximately Rs. 20,000 crore. Technical bids were opened in September-end to reveal 2 bidders – Siemens and Alstom. The prices quoted by each firm have a staggering difference.
Financial Bid Values
| Firm | Per Unit (Rs. Crore) | Total (Rs. Crore) |
| Siemens Ltd. | 10.98 | 13,177 |
| Alstom Transport India Ltd. | 19.46 | 23,362 |
Siemens’ bid of Rs. 13,177 crore was way below the Indian Railways’ estimate, so I see a contract getting awarded in the coming weeks without a long financial bid evaluation period.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi in April had laid the foundation stone to upgrade the nearly century-old Dahod railway workshop to manufacture these 9,000 electric locomotives. The project is expected to provide direct and indirect employment to over 10,000 people.
The first locomotive is expected to roll out of Dahod by mid-2024. Per the tender’s schedule, 1,200 locomotives must be manufactured at the Dahod facility in 11 years between 2023-2034. 300 locomotives will each be maintained and stabled at Indian Railways’ depots located at Kharagpur (West Bengal), Visakhapatnam (Andhra Pradesh), Raipur (Chhattisgarh) and Pune (Maharashtra).
I typically don’t post about the Indian Railways due to reasons, but this contract, its size and implications just couldn’t be ignored.
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– TMRG
@tmrg pls post abt 200 trainset vande bharat tender aswell..that is also a huge tender of more than 25k crore n thr r 5 bidders
Do you have an official doc / source confirming the 5 bidders? I don’t rely on media reports.
Are you not covering about Bangalore metro? Haven’t seen any update on the site from last couple of months.
Will Siemens also design the locomotives like Alstom?
Definitely have their own design which IR will review
Siemens
Vector coming to India?
Vectron? Let’s see
Smartron more likely. Vectron is designed for multi-system.
Is this the first major contract won by Siemens in India?
Rolling stock? Yup.
Actually Siemens is a major supplier to IR already, but they have never won a full rolling stock contract from IR. Siemens IGBT control systems, traction motors and many other components can be found in many electric locos, EMUs etc. Also note this is only the third such contract by IR, after the HHP electric loco one which Alstom won, and the HHP diesel one which GE won. Earlier contracts would mostly be about small initial order and subsequent tech transfer like the LHB coach, or the EMD locos.
Siemens Vectron coming to India?
Smartron more likely. Vectron is designed for multi-system.
What a price difference though, wow. Wonder why.
This was deliberately done.. Railways dint want a Alstom monopoly in locos..so they asked them to quote high
why would Alstom quote high? They quoted based on the bus estimate given by railways. They did not know Siemens will go the extra mile to get their first major rolling stock contract.
They can ask Siemens to bid low but again why would they do that because if there are severe cost overruns then it will be difficult to answer.
Why are you expecting a fast evaluation? Typically for government tenders if the quoted price is below a certain percentage of the estimate, the L1 bidder is asked to prove/reconfirm their bid and additional information is typically asked to ensure the contract doesn’t fail due to an accounting error.
Northern india. Caste vote to bjp for gujrati businessman development
You serious?
This is not a lowest bid to reconfirm company values. Siemens had proved IR through multiple contracts including mrvnl phase 2 emu rolling stock and emd onboard chips! So, Neither Siemens a fresh firm for this industry nor to railways. Like wise Dassualt aviation in defence, Alstom in rail enjoy deepest contracts winning in IR SECTOR, which they had largest contract ever (marhora-Bihar). So by going though they should have come with valuable quote. 19cr is too much. 25cr for wag12 accepted due to loco mft plant that time through fdi! Alstom failed to concession!
Vry new technology development in feature for bt i say 1person coment northen Indian vote for depend on cast &Gujarat vote for business development i will say Mr . P.m sahaab when u take a seat 2014 big company , mnc group in Seattle in Gujarat, wy u are p.m all Indian not a particular single state.
Very new technology development in feature for but i say 1person comment northern Indian vote for depend on cast &Gujarat vote for business development i will say Mr . P.m sahaab when u take a seat 2014 big company , Multi national company group in Seattle in Gujarat, wy u are p.m all Indian not a particular single state.