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One of the largest export projects in the history of Hungarian industry is underway in Egypt, where 914 Hungarian-made railway carriages are already in use.
914 carriages have already been delivered to the Egyptian National Railways (ENR) from an order placed by TMH International AG, a member of the Transmashholding (TMH) group, and a consortium of Hungarian wagon manufacturer Magyar Vagon in 2018, Iho reports.
The deal for the construction of 1,350 railroad cars is worth more than EUR 1 billion,
making it one of the largest export projects in the history of Hungarian industry.
Photo via Facebook/Egyptian National Railways
According to the portal, Egyptian Transport Minister Kamel Al-Wazir recently received András Kovács, the head of mission of the Embassy of Hungary in Cairo and the head of the manufacturing company, at his office. Al-Wazir stressed that
so far, 914 of the 1,350 cars have been delivered to the customer.
During the meeting, the parties also clarified when the cars that have not yet been delivered will arrive in Egypt.
According to the original agreement, the main components of the five different versions of the vehicle family were to be produced by the Tver Carriage Works (TVZ) of Transmashholding (TMH). Some of the wagons would be built there, and 678 wagons would be assembled in Tver, Russia, half of the wagons in Hungary, and the other half in Dunakeszi Járműjavító (‘Vehicle Repairer’).
The first batch of Russian-made cars was completed in October 2019, and following various running tests in the first half of 2020, some of which were also carried out in Hungary, the vehicles were delivered to their destination in the summer. Construction of the first Hungarian-made rail cars started in Dunakeszi (near Budapest) in the autumn of 2020, and they were shipped to Egypt in February 2021. ENR took delivery of the 300th car in the spring of 2021.
Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the European Union imposed severe sanctions on Russia, leading to a significant change in the ownership of the consortium in June that year. Magyar Vagon Befektetési Vagyonkezelő (Hungarian Wagon Investment Asset Management) acquired TMH International AG’s stake in TMH Hungary Invest, owning Dunakeszi Járműjavító, thus bringing the company, which is of strategic importance for the national economy, under full Hungarian ownership and has since been operating as Ganz-MaVag Invest. In addition, it acquired a 100% stake in Transmashholding Hungary, which will continue to operate under the name Ganz-MaVag International.
Via Iho; Featured image via Facebook/Egyptian National Railways