German engineering giant Siemens has no intention of making a bid for the transport division of ailing French rival, Alstom, informed sources said on Monday, rejecting a corresponding newspaper report at the weekend.
Siemens makes the German high-speed train ICE, while Alstom produces the French equivalent, the TGV.
But the sources said that a merger of the two would not make sense for competition reasons.
Siemens chairman Heinrich von Pierer had already said last month that a tie-up between the ICE and TGV would prove very complicated for reasons of competition.
A report in the Saturday edition of the daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung quoted sources close to the German government as saying that Siemens had prepared a bid to purchase Alstom's entire technical rail transport division, which includes the makers of the high-speed TGV trains - one of the prides of French civil engineering. A spokesman for Siemens refused to comment.
The newspaper said a bid by Siemens for Alstom's transport division could be a tactical ploy to force France into a compromise in the planned rescue of Alstom. Siemens has already let it be known that it was interested in parts of the French group, notably its turbines business.
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