Leo Express to run services to Germany, Austria, Slovakia and Poland

Leo Express intends to run loads more international services from December this year.
They applied for paths at the Czech Office for Access to Transport Infrastructure for the following corridors:

• Prague-Berlin (D), 6 trains daily
  
• Prague-Brno-Bratislava (SK), 5 trains daily
  
• Prague-Brno-Vienna (A), 3 trains daily
  
• Prague-Karvina, 8 trains daily
• Prague-Košice (SK), 3 trains daily
  
• Prague-Kraków (PL), 2 trains daily
  
• Prague-Olomouc-Bratislava (SK), 3 trains daily
  
• Prague-Olomouc-Vienna (A), 3 trains daily
  
• Prague-Staré Město u Uherského Hradiště, 5 trains daily
• Prague-Wrocław (PL), 5 trains daily

Source: https://www.uicr.cz/uredni-deska?view=detail&id=35

One can certainly question if that many attractive paths are available on the Praha to Berlin line.
Competion on rails is certainly challenging in Germany.

Bratislava/Vienna via Olomouc looks interesting, as it offers new opportunities rather than going head to head to head with CD and RJ. Wroclaw likewise.

Wait and see if they are actually offered paths though.

They just have 5x5-car Stadler Flirts though, with more EMUs on order from China.
I think they also combine services with split/join en route, so these may not be individual services throughout (eg Prague-Vienna/Bratislava).
They also tend to stop at more stations on a route than ČD fast services do.
More Dresden-Berlin trains would be popular in Germany, 2-hourly DB is quite poor really.

LNW-GW Joint said:

They also combine services with split/join en route, so these may not be individual services throughout (eg Prague-Vienna/Bratislava).

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Not sure they split at the moment, but I suspect there is some double counting going on (eg Karvina is en route to Kosice...)

One ready a lot about chinese build EMUs. If they are successful, it could be a terrible day for the European industry.

duesselmartin said:

One ready a lot about chinese build EMUs. If they are successful, it could be a terrible day for the European industry.

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I think that is a very big "if". They haven't made any significant inroad into the UK car industry, nor are their bus offerings anything other than cheap and nasty.

A train is a long-term investment, so buying cheap rubbish off eBay won't do.

The manufacturers are definitely worried. Competition from China was cited as the primary reason behind the merger of Siemens and Alstom's rolling stock divisions.

I'm sure the CEOs of Siemens, Alstom and Bombardier say a prayer every night before bed that this first attempt to authorize chinese EMUs for use in the EU turns into an Ansalso Breda-style farce and nobody ever orders any again, but we'll have to wait and see.

Even if they come ready-equipped IMO there's almost no chance of having these new EMUs accepted, and then approved to operate in CZ and DE, plus driver training etc, by December. There's also nothing else available off the shelf which can do the job. I suspect the only way would be to "do a Wrexham and Shropshire" and pinch the locomore rolling stock paired with a suitable cross-border loco, or hire some more.

JonathanP said:

Even if they come ready-equipped IMO there's almost no chance of having these new EMUs accepted, and then approved to operate in CZ and DE, plus driver training etc, by December. There's also nothing else available off the shelf which can do the job. I suspect the only way would be to "do a Wrexham and Shropshire" and pinch the locomore rolling stock paired with a suitable cross-border loco, or hire some more.

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There's tons of charter stock out there to hire if they need it.