SWITZERLAND: Following the insolvency of Austria’s Alpine Bau group earlier this year, the company’s Swiss subsidiary has now been sold to Wien-based Renaissance Construction AG.
Headquartered in Hergiswil, the Swiss business unit is one of the four partners in the Transtec Gotthard consortium, which is the general contractor responsible for fitting out the Gotthard Base Tunnel. Within the consortium, Alpine Bau was working in partnership with Balfour Beatty Rail to install slab track in the twin-bore tunnel.
The consortium confirmed on September 12 that it had been monitoring the situation since the insolvency announcement in June, and had convened a special committee to ensure that contractual obligations were met, as well as keeping project promoter AlpTransit Gotthard AG informed.
Transtec Gotthard says the transfer of ownership of Alpine Bau’s Swiss business will have ‘no direct impact’ on the project, as the Hergiswil company will continue to meet its obligations as a shareholder in the consortium and its staff will continue working with Balfour Beatty Rail on the trackwork. According to Transtec Gotthard, the fit-out work is proceeding to plan, and it expects to hand over a fully-operational base tunnel to AlpTransit Gotthard in May 2016.
