Germany
“Return on capital employed rose from 7.2% to 8.1%, showing how strong our company is and bringing us a step closer to our target of 10%.” Rüdiger Grube
posted a ƒ31m increase in Ebit for the first half, DB Schenker Rail recorded a ƒ34m fall. This reflects a 2.6% drop in railfreight traffic to 202.3 million tonnes. Volumes fell by 4.9% to 54 billion tonne-km.
in 2011 and better management of engineering works which has helped to improve punctuality by 2.2% during the first half of 2012. Currently 93.5% of trains arrive within 15 minutes of schedule, which is slightly ahead of target. Homburg also says DB’s effort to improve train comfort is paying off. “We hear that our staff are providing good service to passengers,” he says. “Our competitiveness has not worsened and we are competitive with the car on price.”
DB has finally started to take delivery
of Talent 2 emus from Bombardier, although DB’s chief financial officer Dr Richard Lutz says there is still a delay in delivery of the trains compared with agreed deadlines, due to the difficulty in getting them approved for operation. In early June, the Federal Railway Agency (EBA) approved the new class 407 ICE trains for single operation, but Siemens and DB are still awaiting approval for multiple operation. Siemens has told DB that eight trains will be delivered by the end of the year. “This will mean that we will finally have a somewhat greater number of trains available for use as a reserve in the coming winter months,” says Grube. He also confirmed DB’s commitment to modernise or renew its entire long- distance passenger fleet by 2020. DB is currently investing ƒ250m to
refurbish more than 770 locomotive- hauled long-distance coaches with new interiors, more modern restaurant cars, and reliability modifications. The Hamburg - Cologne - Stuttgart Intercity route is the first to receive the renovated coaches and will have completely switched over by December. A new open-access operator, HKX,
34
recently launched a service in competition with DB on the Hamburg - Cologne section. “I’m happy that this is finally happening,” says Homburg. “We have always said that competition is part of business. Our competitors decide what they want to do, but we won’t change our offer in terms of fares or services.”
Weak freight performance
Turning to freight, DB Schenker Logistics reported a 3.3% increase in revenue in the first half of 2012, but as Lutz explains, the picture is less rosy. “On a comparable basis, the increase declines to only 1% due mainly to exchange rate factors. The weak economic climate is also reflected in DB Schenker Rail where revenues are roughly unchanged compared with last year.” While DB Schenker Logistics
“We have always said that competition is part of business. Our competitors decide what they want to do, but we won’t change our offer in terms of fares or services.”
Ulrich Homburg
Dr Karl-Friedrich Rausch, DB’s management board member for transport and logistics, says the results are broadly in line with expectations and he is confident the final result will be better than this. “You can see we have a weakening, which started in the last quarter of 2011, but it is not a crisis,” he says. “In Britain, traffic is very stable, while in France traffic is growing with new automotive customers. Spain is in recession, which is not a surprise and we had already planned a restructuring here, and in Poland we are taking restructuring measures. “In Germany, steel traffic is going down, and automotive and chemicals traffic are both weak, but sea freight is still growing so intermodal railfreight is growing strongly. There are now signs that traffic is stabilising overall in Germany, and so by the end of the year we expect to be only 1% down compared with 2011.”
Looking at the overall picture, Lutz is cautiously optimistic: “We are seeing a noticeable weakening of the economy, but I don’t think we’re on the brink of a global recession as we were in 2009,” he says. “I see positive developments in passenger and infrastructure over the rest of the year. Such an assessment is based on the assumption that the problems relating to the euro crisis are resolved in such a way that confidence returns to the markets and that the real economy can return to stable and sustainable rates of growth.” Nevertheless, DB has reduced its
IRJ September 2012
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