Alstom to utilize new aluminium technology for Vande Bharat trains

Alstom has reportedly announced deploying new aluminium technology for Vande Bharat trains. The news came after the company’s CEO Henri Poupart-Lafarge officially said that new tech would be deployed for Vande Bharat for the first ever.

Alstom’s engineering team in Bengaluru will design the Vande Bharat trains, while the parts of the trains will be made in Gujarat, said Henri Poupart-Lafarge.

In an interview with CNBC TV-18, Alstom CEO highlighted the importance of Vande Bharat project for the Indian railways. He also said that Alstom is on the right track to meet the 1 billion EURO turnover target from India.

"Our turnover in India has grown by over 40 percent this year... Over 25 percent of Alstom's engineering work is being done in India, and we want to take this figure to 33 percent as we aim to achieve the 1 billion euro target in terms of turnover from India," explained Alstom CEO.

At the end of May 2023, Alstom emerged as the lowest bidder for the building and maintenance of 100 Vande Bharat trains with aluminium bodies. The French railway major reportedly won the INR 30,000 crore deal, quoting the cost of INR 151 crore for each trainset, 11 per cent less than the second lowest bid of INR 169 crore/trainset submitted by the Staddler and Medha consortium.

A month later, the Indian Railways asked Alstom to lower the cost of each train to INR 150.9 crore. The Railways aims to launch the first Vande Bharat sleeper train by Q1 2024.