KUALA LUMPUR: China CNR Corporation Ltd, touted as the second-biggest manufacturer of rail and rapid transit vehicles in the country, is keen to invest in the proposed monorail test track in Penang together with MRail International Sdn Bhd.

This follows the cementing of a joint venture (JV) between local-based MRail and CNR’s subsidiary Tangshan Railway Vehicle Co in Beijing last Friday. It also to a large extent confirms speculation that a China state-owned company was the likely partner for MRail in its plans to enter the monorail market in Malaysia and the region.

MRail founder and president Datuk Jeyakumar Varathan said the JV allows the company to market Tangshan’s products, including its medium-speed magnetic levitation (Maglev) train and traditional rail bogie internationally.

“I am doing a study on the proposed investment. Nevertheless, they (CNR) are ready to invest in Malaysia to eventually make it a railway hub for the international market jointly with MRail and prepared to transfer technology here,” he told The Edge Financial Daily.

Based on the JV letter, Tangshan has also agreed to fund projects that MRail undertakes subject to a project-to-project basis and to terms and conditions.

The Penang state government had recently given the green light to MRail to build and commission a RM70 million monorail test track in Batu Kawan. It is understood that the ground-breaking for the project is scheduled for Jan 23.

Jeyakumar said the test-track is part of a bigger plan to eventually build an assembly plant for monorail cabs for their potential clients in South Africa and other parts of the world.

He added that CNR was also expected to play a role in this bigger plan.

“CNR and MRail will jointly assemble rail cabs in Malaysia and brand them as made-in-Malaysia products,” he added.

Jeyakumar had told The Edge weekly MRail would form a consortium that includes Middle Eastern and Chinese investors to fund the venture. The consortium would rope in a Japanese technology partner.

If everything goes according to plan, the Batu Kawan test track project would be the third test track here after MMC-Metrail’s in Nilai and Scomi Rail’s in Rawang.

Two years ago, Jeyakumar hogged the limelight in the international monorail scene when he and a few other Malaysians via a consortium called Newcyc Consortium won the job to build a US$1.7 billion (RM5.8 billion) elevated monorail line linking Johannesburg and Soweto in Gauteng province, South Africa. Although the construction of the 44.7km Gauteng line did not take off as scheduled, Jeyakumar gained some prominence among the media there.

It was reported that Jeyakumar, via his vehicle Newcyc Vision, was also involved in building similar monorail systems in India and Sri Lanka.

CNR manufactures locomotive and rolling stock for markets in China, Australia, Asia and Africa. It is in the process of listing on the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

It has been reported that the company would offer its shares to the public on Friday and expects to make its debut in Shanghai no later than Dec 29.

Based on its website, CNR was reorganised from China Northern Locomotive and Rolling Stock Industry (Group) Corporation in June 2008.  It has the capacity to produce 460 diesel locomotives, 370 electric locomotives, 2,300 passenger coaches, 1,100 urban railway vehicles and 26,000 freight wagons per annum.

CNR provides more than half of 500,000 locomotives and rolling stocks running on over 70,000 kilometres of Chinese railway.


This article appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, December 15, 2009.