ÖBB Annual Report 2023

4 Board of Management & Supervisory Board December. There were manifold reasons for this: new trains ordered had a delivery delay of over two years, which led to significantly more intensive use of existing rolling stock. Train cancellations were the result of the shorter maintenance intervals and more frequent stopovers of the existing trains in the workshop. New day and night trains and a new ÖBB company in Germany ÖBB is investing over six billion euros over the next few years to counteract future bottlenecks in rolling stock. In total, more than 300 new trains are on their way. We believe we are well equipped for the future as we aim to increase capacity by approx. 50 percent by 2030 in long-distance transport alone. But it is not only the rolling stock that is new. Last year, ÖBB started the acquisition of the railway undertaking Go-Ahead, which operates local transport routes in southern Germany. The transport services provided by the new subsidiary roughly correspond to those of ÖBB-Personenverkehr AG in Tyrol and Vorarlberg. RCG holds its own despite decline in transport volumes ÖBB’s freight transport division had another difficult past year, but was still able to achieve a positive business result due to the consistent strategy of internationalisation pursued in recent years. The main reason for this was the success of the Rail Cargo Group’s (RCG) foreign subsidiaries, particularly in the area of end-to-end logistics. The negative consequences of the gloomy global economy, the ongoing war in Ukraine and the renewed flare-up of the conflict in the Middle East were therefore largely offset. In contrast, the widening price gap between electricity and diesel prices – coupled with the inflation-induced increase in other fixed costs – again led to a distortion of competition in favour of road transport. The RCG is increasingly investing in an attractive overall rail logistics offering to counteract this trend: with multimodal transport solutions that offer an optimal mix of different modes of transport, digitalisation projects such as the “MIKE” logistics platform, which makes the handling of transports simpler, more transparent and more efficient, as well as further international expansion. Efficient and secure infrastructure as a guarantee of success Austria was once again the top-ranked railway country in the EU last year, despite the problems mentioned above. The basis for this success is an efficient and safe rail infrastructure, which we have been able to maintain in Austria for many years. The planning basis for this is “The investments will help to achieve the necessary increase in capacity on the railways – through new routes and the digitalisation of rail operations.” CEO ANDREAS MATTHÄ. Chairman of the Board