Deutsche Bahn braces for 'bloody battle' - Germany

German national railway Deutsche Bahn is bracing for a "bloody battle" with French peer SNCF, which has said it intends to compete on major European routes, a Bahn director said on Friday in an interview.

"It will be a bloody battle that will leave deep scars in the balance sheets," Ulrich Homburg, director of passenger transport for Deutsche Bahn told the Financial Times Deutschland.

SNCF plans to offer inter-city service in Germany, either under its own name or that of its public transport subsidiary Keolis, a source close to the matter told AFP on Thursday.

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I think the question should be.. Passengers will obtain benefit from SNCF offering its services..
This kind of thing is happening all the time with airlines from other countries offering competing services so I really don't understand why railways should get an special treatment.
In fact I consider IC service is fairly superior that its french counterpart, so they have little to feel worry about.

Well I certainly won't be using SNCF, ICEs are much nicer than TGVs

The comments from the DB people are a bit melodramatic... comparing competition to war. DB has a strong tie-in to the German travelling public through the Bahn card system, so I think it highly unlikely that SNCF is going to drive DB to the wall.

So they call 2 train companies competing a war, but they don't call what they're doing in Afghanistan a war, go figure.

There have been tensions between SNCF and DB for a number of years now. I find it head-bangingly stupid that two state-owned organisations that are on the same side are so busy competing with each other that they haven't got the time to focus on the real enemy – budget airlines. These organisations should be focused on one thing and one thing only: extending the European high-speed rail network as quickly and as extensively as possible. We needed these lines twenty years ago. Anything else now is just a distraction.

Have to agree, some of the seating on TGV's is worse than on budget airlines...

I've used both, so whomever gives me the best deal will get my money. Although, I do like to support the "home team", DB...

I welcome this new competition. DB is well known for poor customer service, and the on-time performance, especailly on the Nahverkehr is not so good. Maybe if DB fixes these problems then they would not have to worry so much about the SNCF. If Keolis treats me like a paying customer, and gets me there on time, I will happily take them over DB.

I'm sure France will surrender in the end.

Bring it on.. DB is about the most overpriced thing in Germany I can think of...

Have to agree with Herr Dinksbumps(great name by the way),I would love to travel by train with my family,at least some of the time,but i have yet to get a price that comes anywhere near the cost of driving, price war...bring it on.

Maybe.

That what competition will do, or should the lack there of....

How many ICE trains can be run on a safely on a single track per hour? What is the saturation point?

Some more competition can't be bad but I can see how DB is complaining about competition by SNCF in Germany while at the same time DB is not allowed to offer services in France (except for cargo and the paris-frankfurt line).

Never had the pleasure of using Keolis, but I find both the BOB (operated by their froggy cousins Veolia) and ALX (Arriva) operations to be poor compared to the DB alternatives. In any event, SNCF plans to be competing on intercity routes, and I have no major complains about ICE trains apart from the regular 5-10 minute delays, which is no big deal in the greater scheme of things.

Yeah, €29 from one end of the country to the other on ICE trains, €28 for unlimited travel for five people around an entire Land or €35 around the entire country... outrageous prices!