Kazakhstan's railway stock domestic supply industry evolves

Kazakhstan is one of the largest producers of railway equipment in the Eurasian region, competing with Turkey but well behind Russia, China and India. There has been a good export record: Kazakh-built locomotives have been supplied to Azerbaijan, Moldova, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan. In 2024, four diesel locos worth US$16m were shipped to Mongolia.

The domestic locomotive industry currently comprises Astana-based Lokomotiv Kurastyru Zauyty and Elektrovoz Kurastyru Zauyty. LKZ was launched in 2009 using GE Transportation’s Evolution platform under a technology transfer agreement, and today builds TE33A/TEP33A main line freight and passenger diesel locos and TEM11A shunters. Plant capacity is up to 120 locos/year, with more than 74% local content.

Originally owned by KTZ, it was run as a 50:50 joint venture with Russia’s TMH in 2013-17, but KTZ then sold its stake to GE Transportation, which in turn became Wabtec in 2019. Wabtec is now the sole owner, having bought out TMH’s 50% stake for US$81m.

EKZ was established in 2013 to build Alstom Prima eight-axle KZ8A electric freight locomotives and four-axle KZ4At passenger locos. It was initially a three-way venture between KTZ (50%), Alstom (25%) and TMH (25%). KTZ sold half of its stake to Alstom in 2016, and that company became sole owner in March 2022. In addition to EKZ, Alstom also owns a turnout manufacturing plant in the region. The company has so far invested €126m and plans to spend a further €35m developing five facilities for servicing locomotives and components; it aims to increase the localisation of its rolling stock assembly from 31% to 39% by 2025.

During the China-Central Asia Summit at Xi’an in May 2018, CRRC announced plans to establish a third locomotive assembly plant in conjunction with Kazakh carrier Silkway Transit, backed by China National Technical Import & Export Corp.

Wagon builders

Since 2008, Pavlodar-based Kazakhstan Wagon Building Co, owned by KTZ, has been delivering open box wagons of various types. Meanwhile, TMH subsidiary Ziksto JSC in Petropavl has been building Type 13-9781 well wagons in partnership with Russia’s Kanash Wagon Works, a subsidiary of Promtraktor-Vagon JSC.

Cool Infinity, which was established in Petropavl in 2019 and changed ownership earlier this year, has the capacity to produce up to 300 model 16-1881 self-contained refrigerator and 16-1807-04 isothermal thermo wagons.

Texol Group is building a production facility in Atyrau region at a cost of 76bn tenge, able to build up to 6 000 wagons/year. This is initially expected to supply doublestack wagons with a 23·5 tonne axleload, followed by articulated Type 13-6741 well cars with 25TF bogies, and LPG tank wagons from 2025. Texol is one of Kazakhstan’s largest wagon owners, and already has an overhaul facility in Atyrau operating as West Kazakhstan Service Co.

Passenger trials

The largest manufacturer of passenger stock is the Tulpar plant in Astana. This was founded in 2010 as a KTZ joint venture with Patentes Talgo to produce articulated trainsets. It passed to government ownership in 2019 following legal proceedings and termination of the contract with the Spanish company, officially because of ‘identified operational deficiencies’, but locally attributed to the 2016 collapse in the exchange rate. Talgo maintained a presence in Kazakhstan until 2022, providing maintenance services for the trains, despite the ending of production after just 676 of the planned 3 000 vehicles.

Two Chinese companies, Ukraine’s KVZ, TMH subsidiary TVSZ and Stadler all sought to claim the plant and its assets. A contract was signed in 2018 for TMH to purchase 99% of the shares from JSC Remlokomotiv for €23m, and 146 coaches were duly assembled and delivered. But this deal was terminated in February 2019, and in 2022 the plant was taken over by Stadler Rail AG in conjunction with its coach supply contract (p26).

However, TMH has not left the Kazakh market, having started coach production at its Ziksto subsidiary. Approval was given in 2022 to build Type 61-4440 compartment coaches and 61-4447 couchette to a 2008 design, and a first batch of 88 vehicles was delivered to KTZ in 2023. Deliveries are expected to reach 307 by the end of 2024.

Kazakhstan’s biggest rolling stock maintenance and repair companies are Qamqor Lokomotiv and Qamqor Wagon, which together operate 11 locomotive and six wagon repair workshops, two service centres and three production sites. Both companies were acquired in 2022 by a consortium led by Alexey Lebedev, who previously worked at RZD. Other players include Astana Railway Services with four sites, Akmola Wagon Repair Plant, and Alga-ALRZ (formerly Pavlodar Locomotive Repair Plant), which specialises in shunting locomotives. Most of these facilities date back to the Soviet era. As of spring 2024, another 220 small and medium sized enterprises were authorised to undertake rolling stock repairs.

Not all new initiatives have been successful. Russian-controlled company Aktobestil aimed to set up a wheelset production facility in Aktobe for opening in 2025, but this has now been put on hold, due to what the regional administration describes as the ‘current international geopolitical situation’.