Type Private Products Rolling stock Founded 1994 | Industry Rail Headquarters London, United Kingdom | |
 | ||
Key people Mary Kenny
(Chief executive) Owner Cheung Kong Holdings & Cheung Kong Infrastructure Holdings Website www.eversholtrail.co.uk Parent organizations Cheung Kong Holdings, Cheung Kong Infrastructure Holdings, CK Hutchison Holdings | ||
Eversholt Rail Group (formerly HSBC Rail (UK) Limited) is one of the three major ROSCOs (rolling stock operating company) in the United Kingdom. Created in 1994 as part of the privatisation of British Rail, it owns around a third of passenger railway locomotives, multiple units and coaching stock running on Network Rail's system which it leases to various train operators.
Contents
History
Eversholt Leasing was established on 21 March 1994. It was subsequently purchased in a management/employee buyout supported by Candover in February 1996 for £518 million. Thirteen months later Candover sold Eversholt for £726.5 million to Forward Trust Group, part of Midland Bank, which was itself a subsidiary of HSBC.
The privatisation and subsequent sale of the ROSCOs caused a great deal of debate, since the UK National Audit Office asserts that the UK Government had not realised fair market value for the sale of the assets. The sale to Forward Trust saw a 40% increase in the price the Department of Transport had sold the company for. Testimony relating to the sale of Eversholt was given by Andrew Jukes, Managing Director of Forward Trust to the UK Parliament's Select Committee on Public Accounts, 3 June 1998.
HSBC Rail changed its name back to Eversholt in January 2010, and was sold to the Eversholt Investment Group consortium in November 2010.
In January 2015 3i agreed to sell its stake to CK Investments, a joint venture owned by Li Ka-shing's Cheung Kong Holdings (present name CK Hutchison Holdings) and Cheung Kong Infrastructure Holdings (CKI), for £358m. CKI has agreements to buy out all the consortium members subject to regulatory approval for a combined £2.5bn. In May 2015, Eversholt sold its 920 wagons and 63 load unit vehicles - including container flats, autoballasters, coal and aggregate hoppers and box wagons - to NACCO Industries UK subsidiary.
Operations
The May 2015 sale of the groups rail freight stock left the company's rolling stock portfolio consisting of 19 separate fleets of circa 3,500 mainly passenger vehicles - majority various classes of EMU's and DMU's - of which over 3,100 have electric motive power. Notable ownership fleets include the British Rail Class 395 Javelin, and the East Coast Mainline InterCity 225 fleet - consisting of Class 91 electric locomotive, nine Mark 4 coaches and a Driving Van Trailer - and a few British Rail Class 66 locomotives. The company has a team of in-house engineers to strategically maintain the entire fleet, whilst operational maintenance is usually undertaken by the operational lease company. Financing services include operating leases, procurement, refurbishment, engineering support and maintenance improvements.