ABB gets US$24m to revamp locomotives

ABB gets US$24m to revamp locomotives

HONG KONG (JP): PT Abdibangun Buana, a subsidiary of Asea Brown Boveri (ABB), has been appointed to overhaul 21 locomotives of the state-owned railway company Perumka in Medan, North Sumatra.

Joachim Schulze-Warnecke, an executive of Abdibangun Buana, said on Monday that the job contract worth US$24 million would be signed with the Ministry of Transportation in the near future.

Schulze-Warnecke said that the company was directly appointed by the government after it got a loan from a German financial institution, KWF, last year.

"The project, which will take about three years to complete, also includes a training workshop for Perumka employees as well as locomotive spare parts for two years," Schulze-Warnecke said.

Schulze-Warnecke added that his company is also involved in the development of a signaling system in the eastern section of the Cikampek-Cirebon railway project in West Java.

"We are looking forward to participating in many other railway projects such as the one in Depok (south of Jakarta) and the relocation of the Manggarai station (in Central Jakarta)," he said.

Earlier this year, ABB merged with Daimler-Benz AG to form an equally-owned new company called Adtranz group.

Kaare Vagner, the president and the chief executive officer of the Adtranz Group, said that the company is also interested in building the first subway system in Indonesia.

The Jakarta administration plans to build a 14.5-kilometer subway linking Blok M in South Jakarta and Kota in West Jakarta. Construction of the US$1.3-billion project will begin in 1997.

"Yes, we are interested in building the whole system of the upcoming subway project in Indonesia," Vagner said. (yns)