Japan Challenges China In Bullet Train Export Market

Japan is taking on China in the export of high speed rail.

From 2014, The Diplomat: Is the Maglev Japan’s Next Big Export Technology?

For Abe, successfully exporting maglev technology to a prime Western market would not only be a political victory; it would show investors in the new Tokyo/Nagoya/Osaka line that the technology can be profitable outside Japan, where profit won’t be seen for decades after the line is built. The ability to take a technology beyond the domestic market is one of the cornerstones of the Japanese economy. Locating those foreign markets and providing the right incentives to places in need of either an upgrade or entry into high-speed rail will be the first challenge Japan faces.

Nippon: Exporting the Maglev Dream: Can the Bullet Train Go Global?

Now Japan has taken another giant step forward with the commercialization of its own linear maglev Shinkansen technology.

The technology’s backers are not just gambling on the success of the Chūō Shinkansen. They are also betting that Japanese-style advanced high-speed rail transport is exportable. “Many countries that are thinking of building new railways would do well to adopt a brand-new system from the start,” says Kasai. In April 2014 four companies of the JR group jointly established the International High-Speed Rail Association (Shukuri Masafumi, chair), which is dedicated to exporting Japanese-style high-speed rail systems to such countries.

A key focus of the export campaign will be the highest volume passenger-train route in the United States: the Northeast Corridor, which runs 730 km along the northeastern seaboard, from Boston through New York City, Philadelphia, and Baltimore to Washington DC. Most of the Northeast Corridor is owned by Amtrak, which operates America’s only high-speed rail service, the Acela Express, between Boston and Washington DC.

...JR Central, meanwhile, is working with the privately funded Texas Central Railway to export its tried and true Tōkaidō Shinkansen technology to the state of Texas. If the project pans out, an international version of the Nozomi bullet train, the N700-I Bullet, will eventually speed between the cities of Dallas and Houston, a distance of about 360 km. With a combined population of several million and no major existing railways to speak of, the region lends itself to a Shinkansen system. Talks with TCR are making good progress, and construction “could be underway sooner than you think,” according to Kasai.

Not only is Japan targeting the U.S., but also several European countries, in addition to some emerging markets such as Malaysia, Myanmar, Cambodia and Thailand. China has noticed.

iFeng: 日本出击与中国抢高铁市场 安倍作首席推销员 (Japan and China rush to attack high-speed rail market Abe as chief salesman)