Siemens Lands €500 Million Train Contract in Britain

German engineering giant Siemens announced Wednesday it has secured a €500 million contract to deliver 56 intercity trains to a British consortium comprising of British group FirstGroup and French group Keolis. The consortium will take over the franchise to operate the TransPennine rail link in northern England that connects Liverpool with Manchester and Newcastle. The 183-seater trains, which can travel up to 160 kilometers (100 miles) per hour, are scheduled to come into service in 2006, Siemens said in a statement. The company added that the contract would create about 2,000 jobs at a Siemens plant near Krefeld in western Germany and included the servicing and cleaning the trains and the construction of two new depots.