HHLA rail subsidiary Metrans and TransContainer will intensify rail operations on the New Silk Road on the route via Ukraine and Slovakia. The companies signed a letter of intent for closer cooperation in this regard on 1 November.

“TransContainer is a strong partner that Metrans has worked closely with for years. In the future, we want to more strongly concentrate the expertise of our two companies on the Silk Road in order to provide our rail freight customers with an even better range of services between the Far East and Europe,” said Angela Titzrath, Chairwoman of HHLA’s Executive Board during the contract-signing ceremony. The plans include using the rail corridor through Slovakia and Ukraine increasingly for Silk Road transit.

The companies

The Metrans Group is a train operator in Europe, focussing on container transport for seaport-hinterland traffic within Central, Eastern and South-Eastern Europe. The network of HHLA rail subsidiaries comprises thirteen inland terminals in five Central and Eastern European countries. In the first six months of 2018, the company carried 13,000 container trains through Europe.

PJSC TransContainer is a rail transport provider of intermodal container transport and integrated logistics in Russia. Its fleet comprises over 25,000 rail transport cars and nearly 68,000 containers. TransContainer owns and operates sixty terminal facilities in Russia, Kazakhstan and Slovakia.