Industrialist Valer Blidar, who controls Astra Vagoane Calatori of Arad and last year set up Banca Comerciala Feroviara, is set to deliver passenger carriages to Italy starting August for a two-year period, according to a contract whose value has not been disclosed. "Through this contract signed with a railway operator of northern Italy and through another contract we'll sign shortly with another operator of Europe, we are going to offset quite well the reductions generated by this bleaker period of crisis, so that we and our employees should not suffer," stated the owner of Astra Vagoane Calatori. Blidar, 65, has developed a group of companies with turnover worth several tens of million euros from passenger carriage production. He chose not to disclose the number of carriages due to be delivered to Italy, the name of the railway operator or the value of the contract saying "there are a lot of things the competition must not find out, there are confidentiality rules in business that need to be abided by". Should the company deliver 100 carriages to the Italian operator, it could cash in between 55 and 85m euros, in line with ZF calculations.

Industrialist Valer Blidar, who controls Astra Vagoane Calatori of Arad and last year set up Banca Comerciala Feroviara, is set to deliver passenger carriages to Italy starting August for a two-year period, according to a contract whose value has not been disclosed. "Through this contract signed with a railway operator of northern Italy and through another contract we'll sign shortly with another operator of Europe, we are going to offset quite well the reductions generated by this bleaker period of crisis, so that we and our employees should not suffer," stated the owner of Astra Vagoane Calatori. Blidar, 65, has developed a group of companies with turnover worth several tens of million euros from passenger carri