Vivarail to enter administration

[D365]

It reads like they were losing money all along but were being backed financially by one entity (Shooter perhaps?)

Shooter initially, then the Americans (see @James H's reply above, it seems like they wanted to sell Vivarail on).

 

[pdeaves]

How many repurposed trains are there? The 230s, the 484s, the 769s, any others? Vivarail would have struggled not to win that category.

I suppose class 69 and some 73s. Big 'repurposing' mods on passenger-carrying stock seem inherently more complex (and thus costly) than they 'should' be.

 

[WarrenTManager]

TSA is a different sort of firm entirely isn’t it? Austrian with worldwide use of their products?

TSA provide the traction motors. The rest of the traction package is Strukton. https://struktonrail.com/project/2019/04/vivarail/

 

[D365]

TSA provide the traction motors. The rest of the traction package is Strukton. https://struktonrail.com/project/2019/04/vivarail/

Thanks for the clarification. Given my experience, I really should remember better!

 

[david1212]

It seems quite clear why they are in financial trouble. Apparently they have 70 employees. That is at least £3-4 million per annum, possibly double that, in staff costs alone. When you have that sort of outgoings you need to sell stuff and a couple of units here or there isn't going to pay the bills.

This is how I see the root of the problem. It is all very well taking about innovation, research and development etc. rather than minimal work / cost conversion for repurposing but it has to be recovered from sales. Had significantly more Class 230's as the Marston Vale & TfW design and ideally 484's been sold then payback for ongoing fast charge and BEMU development even if sold to be installed in new build vehicles rather than supplied as the power package within complete BEMU's based on the ex-TfL D78's.

 

[Babybirdrobin]

The D78s as withdrawn by London Underground would have been a massive step up internally over the 483s.

And mechanically they were in decent enough condition. It wasn't as if they NEEDED all the extra work done on them, even if was desitable.

Agreed

 

[norbitonflyer]

I suppose class 69 and some 73s.

Class 57 as well?

 

[Doomotron]

The best hope I guess is that the operations of Vivarail are continued under another company, even if it's just to maintain the existing 230/484 fleets.

 

[Neen Sollars]

I understand the financial backer was an American whose big idea was to introduce "pop up" trains on the US network. A demo 230 has been over there for some time. Clearly the concept has not taken off in the States and there has been no substantial orders for a fleet of 230`s in the UK since TfW, or perhaps they have been laid up for so long that the Island Line 484`s were the last offerings. I cannot see how any TOC or leasing company would take a risk that Vivarail could produce a reliable product. The money man was pouring money down the drain. All those employees producing what? Shame the vision failed, but understandable in the circs.

 

[D365]

All those employees producing what?

Not sure what you mean. Up until Friday there were several different projects in the works.

 

[abn444]

The D78s as withdrawn by London Underground would have been a massive step up internally over the 483s.

And mechanically they were in decent enough condition. It wasn't as if they NEEDED all the extra work done on them, even if was desitable.

Apart from the new traction equipment, isn't the bare minimum effectively what they did? I'm sure the basic interior refresh and conversion to 3rd rail (from 4th rail) would have needed doing if they were going to the island whoever did it

 

[Invincible]

What next for Vivarail? - Rail Engineer

Listen to this article The imperative to decarbonise the railway has been the subject of various reports, conferences, and research grants, although, in reality, little new operational hardware has been produced to meet this challenge since Jo Johnson’s call to remove diesels in February 2018...

www.railengineer.co.uk

This article gives some of the reasoning behind the D78 conversion and Vivarails aims.
The new AC motors added more efficiency and life to the lightweight bodies.
Looks like they were after the Sprinter replacement?.

The best hope I guess is that the operations of Vivarail are continued under another company, even if it's just to maintain the existing 230/484 fleets.

Let's hope they get a good administrator who can facilitate this.

 

[WarrenTManager]

I understand the financial backer was an American whose big idea was to introduce "pop up" trains on the US network. A demo 230 has been over there for some time. Clearly the concept has not taken off in the States and there has been no substantial orders for a fleet of 230`s in the UK since TfW, or perhaps they have been laid up for so long that the Island Line 484`s were the last offerings. I cannot see how any TOC or leasing company would take a risk that Vivarail could produce a reliable product. The money man was pouring money down the drain. All those employees producing what? Shame the vision failed, but understandable in the circs.

Producing what? A fast charging 230 that is ready for trial on GWR, see Mr Hopwoods post yesterday on LinkedIn. A 484 fleet that has settled down and running well, winning a golden spanner on Friday.

 

[Bertie the bus]

Not sure what you mean. Up until Friday there were several different projects in the works.

A project isn't a product. Universities are there for people conducting pure research. Companies need to produce something tangible they can then sell. Vivarail may or may not have been good at the research side but it certainly wasn't good at the marketable product development or sales aspects.

 

[Firstof5]

All those employees producing what?

I don't think I can agree with this at all,
Vivarail has produced a charging system that has been demonstrated to work. How such a small team managed to pull this off and get it approved for mainline use must be a small miracle and speaks to the vision and ability of the engineers working there.

Many other posts seem to talk about how the Class 230 is simply a internal rehash of the D78, I don't think this could be further from the truth. From what I have read the only the bogies and body are retained. Even getting approval for a roughly 40 year old body shell to operate on the mainline must have been quite the engineering challenge.

 

[DarloRich]

It is absolutely not a vanity project. You don't buy a sizeable proportion of the D stock fleet for a vanity project.

Although sales have been limited, it was an enterprising, entrepreneurial business: that is something that we should never discourage. It may have failed, but that is the nature of such enterprises: some work, some don't. To criticise - usually from an armchair - without the full facts (as on a forum like this) is very easy. Rather harder to get a venture like this off the ground.

I have no problem with the business or the idea or the entrepreneurial spirit of the company. As a passenger on the Vivarail guinea pig line I REALLY wanted this to work! I DO have a problem with standing in the rain waiting for a train that was never going to come. THAT was the issue. The promise and goodwill of the initial introduction of nice new trains flushed away by poor performance, RRB's and Shanks Pony Rail. There was such positivity around the introduction of the 230's, an interest in the line, a chance to grow passenger numbers and improve servcies. All lost.

It is true the trains have now managed some form of reliability but it took FAR too long to reach that stage and the damage has been done both to the service and, I suspect, the company.

True, I don't know many of the technical challenges behind the scenes or what the Vivarail guys have done to meet them because, to be honest, it got to a stage where I no longer cared. We as mere passengers weren't told what was going on. Just that another train was cancelled and that, sadly, queered the pitch for me and for others.

I was driven to car ownership again by this saga. I hadn't owned a car since moving to MK. I didn't need it. That's how bad it was.

Administration for a UK company very quickly leads to liquiation.

Is that right?

Ok as a potential investor, are you going to put more weight and faith into a company who won an award in LinkedIn over the fact they are facing liquidation?

I am going to do due diligence and see what is of value. An award suggests there might be something there.

To see an entire Class 230 genset removed and replaced on Bletchley depot in twenty minutes flat was pretty impressive and the units were good from a driver's point of view.

That is fantastic innovation and hard work. Sadly, as I say above us passengers no longer cared because the train didn't come out of the shed and run the timetabled services often enough.

 

[Royston Vasey]

Significant part of this was the constant barrage of "other people's cast offs", or "why should we have London's scrapheap" and other negative comments, including on here. This commonly for trains on services where the vast majority of the cost is borne from public funds. And the ambience is perfectly pleasant, such comments often being made by those who have never even ridden in them (or politicians who don't use the train at all). Good idea, killed by negativity.

I have to disagree. The product was crap, delivered without a proper engineering partner (contrast the Scottish fuel cell project and its major sponsors and participants), and they were given so many opportunities to get the engineering and rollout right. COVID didn't help.

The IOW was a slam dunk recycling and updating the traction package on existing vehicles, in principle like for like, while the rest seemed to have proved beyond them, having been given chances by LNWR, Transport for Wales and Great Western for the Greenford trial - which may be dead in the water now.

The failure of Vivarail has very little to do with opinions of enthusiasts and even passengers, and everything to do with the offering, including the resource to support it once on the mainline. Anyone can make a nice interior, but the train has to work and the provider had to be able to keep it working.

I have no joy in saying this because their failure has set back battery electric trains in the UK for years, and they are something we need. Someone like Siemens or Alstom doing modular battery trains and fast recharging properly will make a success of it, but sadly only Vivarail were really in the market, to date.

Right solution but wrong provider.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

I have to disagree. The product was crap, delivered without a proper engineering partner (contrast the Scottish fuel cell project and its major sponsors and participants), and they were given so many opportunities to get the engineering and rollout right. COVID didn't help.

The IOW was a slam dunk recycling of the existing traction package and vehicles, while the rest seemed to have proved beyond them, having been given chances by LNWR, Transport for Wales and Great Western for the Greenford trial - which may be dead in the water now.

The failure of Vivarail has very little to do with opinions of enthusiasts and even passengers, and everything to do with the offering, including the resource to support it once on the mainline. Anyone can make a nice interior, but the train has to work and the provider had to be able to keep it working.

I have no joy in saying this because their failure has set back battery electric trains in the UK for years, and they are something we need. Someone like Siemens or Alstom doing modular battery trains and fast recharging properly will make a success of it, but sadly only Vivarail were really in the market, to date.

Right solution but wrong provider.

Alstom ne Bombardier hasn't fared any better with the 701's either despite being a global engineering behemoth.

Scotrail are committed to BEMUs and until the industry in England is delivering at a cost DfT feels is affordable they ain't going to authorise anymore expenditure on new rolling stock let alone more expensive "green" trains.

It was the vision that Adrian Shooters generation had that got BR through the bad times of the 1980's and laid a foundation that allowed he industry to significantly expand again.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

It needs someone like Jim Ratcliffe to bail Vivarail out with his multiple lines of business in Ineos.
But he comes at things from an oil/chemical background, though he appears to be getting into decarbonising the Grangemouth refinery with Rolls Royce.

 

[the sniper]

There seems to have been a fair amount of comments about the potential need to replace the 230s and 484s given Vivarail's situation. Should they really have ever been ordered if their continued use relied on Vivarail's continued existence? Surely there was always a reasonable chance that a company as small as Vivarail would be fairly short lived as a manufacturer (at least), so there should have always been a plan for the units to live on without their creator existing, if they were going to be ordered?

 

[Bantamzen]

When the Vivarail project began the idea of building brand new DMUs seemed verboten, hence there appeared to be a much larger market for D-trains than there eventually turned out to be as, of course, we are getting brand new DMUs after all. I think the speed of the D-trains has proven to be a big hinderance, meaning its been restricted to a few fairly isolated parts of the network.

The big prize they were eyeing was Northern and the Pacer replacements, and it was certainly a popular idea at the time here. However can you imagine the state of Northern's network had they / the DfT taken that punt over the CAF units? We almost certainly still have Pacers bouncing around the network. With hindsight not taking VivaRail's option was most certainly the better one for Northern, and I'm sure quietly TfW are thinking the same.

 

[zwk500]

There seems to have been a fair amount of comments about the potential need to replace the 230s and 484s given Vivarail's situation. Should they really have ever been ordered if their continued use relied on Vivarail's continued existence? Surely there was always a reasonable chance that a company as small as Vivarail would be fairly short lived as a manufacturer (at least), so there should have always been a plan for the units to live on without their creator existing, if they were going to be ordered?

I don't think there will be such a need. If vivarail gets liquidated I would expect the relevant rights, documentation and Intellectual property to be bought up either by another company or by the DfT and then licensed out.
DfT are most likely IMHO, but a ROSCO or even somebody like Colas could bid for them.

 

[Ibex]

Vivarail have now formally confirmed today they have entered administration. Presumably there will be some kind of press release soon but the Marston Vale line service has now been suspended too.

 

[Mike395]

Sad news - looks like the last Marston Vale service before the suspension is just arriving at Bedford. Hopefully LNWR will be able to work something out and possibly take the maintenance of the 230s in-house saving some of the jobs too?

 

[DarloRich]

Hopefully LNWR will be able to work something out and possibly take the maintenance of the 230s in-house saving some of the jobs too?

Vivarail have now formally confirmed today they have entered administration. Presumably there will be some kind of press release soon but the Marston Vale line service has now been suspended too.

Firstly I hope the jobs of the guys who work at Bletchley are saved. That is most important in all of this.

There is nothing on twitter or websites to suggest a service suspension on the Vale but I assume that is because there is no maintenance cover. O hope a solution can be found ASAP. In the meantime i hope a RRB is put on as soon as possible. There are people who will need to get home tonight.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Vivarail have now formally confirmed today they have entered administration. Presumably there will be some kind of press release soon but the Marston Vale line service has now been suspended too.

Are the units actually owned and operated by Vivarail? It seems strange the service would be suspended, just as Class 323s weren't laid up when Hunslet TPL went pop.

Yep, I hope a quick call to Centrebus (who usually supplied the RRB when it was there on standby) bears fruit!

There's a nondescript line on LNR's site saying it's disrupted, but RTT is showing the whole service as cancelled.

 

[zwk500]

Are the units actually owned and operated by Vivarail? It seems strange the service would be suspended, just as Class 323s weren't laid up when Hunslet TPL went pop.

Even if they are, companies can continue operating under administrators.

 

[Silverlinky]

LNR 230's are leased from VivaRail therefore they are unable to continue in service. There are no maintenance staff left on site as of this afternoon.

 

[43096]

Are the units actually owned and operated by Vivarail? It seems strange the service would be suspended, just as Class 323s weren't laid up when Hunslet TPL went pop.

Yep, I hope a quick call to Centrebus (who usually supplied the RRB when it was there on standby) bears fruit!

There's a nondescript line on LNR's site saying it's disrupted, but RTT is showing the whole service as cancelled.

It will depend on who Entity in Charge of Maintenance is. If it is Vivarail (which it is for Marston Vale) then you can’t keep running.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

Messy situation. Here’s hoping LNR source a replacement service for the route A.S.A.P. I doubt any 172s will be available while they’re still covering for Hereford stock.