Renfe has closed a strategic alliance to debut in the Italian market with the acquisition of a 33% stake in the capital of Longitude Holding, a private Italian company that operates under the trade name Arenaways.
As reported by Renfe this Wednesday, specifically, it has been its company Renfe International Projects through which the acquisition was made. The first project will be the reopening and operation of a regional passenger service in Piedmont starting in January.
Longitude Holding is a private Italian company founded in Turin in 2021 by a group of investors with more than 30 years of experience in the sector that has the necessary authorizations to operate on both regional and long-distance routes in Italy.
The company made public today this expansion of its corporate structure in which, along with Renfe Proyectos Internacionales, the Spanish company also participates with another 33%. Serena Industrial Partnersan independent investment manager dedicated to essential infrastructure projects with special attention to mobility projects and presence in five countries.
The new holding company will begin operating imminently. The Piedmont Mobility Agency has entrusted Longitude with the operation of the passenger service on two regional routes for the next 10 years: the one that connects the towns of Cunneo, Saluzzo and Saviglianoand the one that connects Ceva and Ormea, worth 54 million euros.
The service on the first of the routes will begin next January and the second, once the infrastructure adaptation works by RFI (Italian Railway Network). Longitude intends to extend its operation to new routes, both public service and commercial, and has already obtained authorization from the Transport Regulatory Authority to launch long-distance connections under an ‘open access’ regime on the Northwest-Northeast and North-Central routes. -South.
With this agreement in Italy, Renfe expands its operations to a new market. So far, Renfe has started operations alone in France where it competes with its AVE trains on two international routes (Lyon and Marseille) to which it will join next year Toulouse. The Spanish company has also positioned itself in the center of Europe, where it operates public obligation services and commercial services in Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland in alliance with the private company Leo Exprés. Renfe is also participating as a strategic consultant and shadow operator in the Rail Baltica project (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania).
The president of Renfe, Raul Blancoentered into this business agreement. “For Renfe, this operation means having new European partners, making its debut in a new market of recognized prestige at the railway level such as the Italian one and at the same time making use of our experience,” he highlighted.
The CEO of Longitude, Matteo Arenadeclared that the company has been defined as the third national operator, but “we do not experience competition in a sense of opposition: competition entails great benefits for users and for the entire community, because it immediately translates into more supply, better services and plurality.
The CEO and founding partner of Serena, Joaquin Camachoadded that he trusts that this project will be “a catalyst” for Serena in Italy.
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