Bulgaria is getting ready to liberalize passenger rail delivery after years of opposition. The plans are for the monopoly of the state-owned corporate BDZ Passenger Shipping to fall from 2026.
Hobby on this area of interest from non-public firms is encouraging to this point. Already a 3rd player has submitted paperwork to the Govt Company “Railway Management” to procure a license. This was transparent all through the general public dialogue of the long run public procurement, which must be introduced subsequent yr.
That is the corporate “Ivkoni Specific”, Mediapool realized. It belongs to Georgi Atanasov, who is among the house owners of Union Ivkoni, the most important passenger delivery corporate in our nation. He declined to remark to Mediapool on what his plans are for getting into rail passenger delivery till he receives a licence.
“Ivkoni Specific”
The corporate “Ivkoni Specific” EAD was once registered in June 2024. The topic of the corporate’s process is sporting out railway transportation of passengers and load within the nation and in a foreign country, in addition to offering or renting locomotives and wagons.
Its capital is BGN 200,000, and the landlord of the corporate is Georgi Lyubomirov Atanasov.
The corporate is controlled via a 3-member board of administrators. Its chairman is Ivaylo Dimitrov Stoyanov, and Teodora Rumenova Veleva is his deputy. Georgi Atanasov is the manager director, it’s transparent from the Business Sign in.
Atanasov didn’t point out which railway strains he was once fascinated by, as did, for instance, PIMK Rail Specific – the primary corporate with a license for passenger rail delivery. It has pastime in 5 railway strains. Those are Sofia – Plovdiv – Burgas, Sofia – Pernik – Radomir, Karnobat – Varna, Plovdiv – Asenovgrad and Sofia – Gorna Oryahovitsa – Shumen – Varna. Alternatively, the Plovdiv corporate already has a license as a railway operator for passenger delivery, and it’s been available on the market for years for freight.
All over the general public dialogue of the process, the previous Minister of Shipping from the time of the triple coalition Nikolay Vassilev referred to as at the non-public firms to come back ahead and publicly provide their intentions. Alternatively, this isn’t going down to this point.
Virtually not anything is understood about the second one corporate that carried out for a license for a railway passenger service – the Stara Zagorje “Reilimpex”.
Magdalena Miltenova, president of the Confederation of Bus Carriers in our nation, commented on how inefficient passenger delivery via educate is, for instance, at the Sofia – Pernik line, on which 10 other trains run each day. One thing that, in step with her, a non-public corporate can not permit.
Miltenova also referred to as to take into consideration defining particular positions someday order. Now the proposal of the Ministry of Shipping is to divide it into 3 a lot – two from Sofia to Varna and to Burgas and for all the closing territory.
This department won essential opinions all through the general public dialogue and from different representatives.
Who’s in the back of “Ivkoni”?
The landlord of “Ivkoni Specific” – 38-year-old Georgi Atanasov is indexed as one of the most precise house owners of the Union Ivkoni bus corporate. Two firms along with his participation cling its capital. 86 % belongs to “Transpekt”, the place Atanasov has 50% and which absolutely owns “Team Plus” EOOD, which in flip owns 14% of “Transpekt”.
In 2018 the 2 biggest carriers in our nation – “Union Ivkoni” and “Team Plus” have been received via the newly registered corporate “Transpekt”, wherein Atanasov holds part of the stocks. Earlier than that, he was once a supervisor at Union Ivkoni. The opposite part of the stocks in “Transpekt” belong to Stoyan Yordanov Dinev.
The impact of the merger of the 2 firms is they cling the passenger bus marketplace in our nation. They’ve strains from Sofia to the ocean and virtually all regional towns in our nation. Till 2015 “Union Ivkoni” additionally served strains of the capital’s public delivery. Through the years, the corporate’s buses were keen on a number of street injuries.
A yr later – in January 2019. “Transpekt” receives two loans from the state-owned Bulgarian Building Financial institution for a complete of greater than 41 million euros with a compensation length of about 9 years every, it’s transparent from the paperwork printed within the Business Sign in.
The primary mortgage of over 29 million euro was once used to shop for the 2 greatest bus firms available in the market. Over 14.3 million euros have been paid to Ivaylo Konstantinov, a former deputy from GERB, who held 49% of the capital of “Union Ivkoni” till 2019. Just about 1.9 million Euros have been paid to “Sintetika” AD for the rest 51% of “Union Ivkoni”, which is a surprisingly low worth in comparison to the cost paid to Konstantinov. For the acquisition of “Team Plus” EOOD of Galya Topalova and “Mineralna voda – Kom” as much as 12.2 million have been paid. euro.
The second one mortgage from BBR is for 12.6 million. euro. The biggest quantity of just about 6.7 million euros went to repay the corporate’s money owed to the Bulgarian-American Credit score Financial institution and the Municipal Financial institution. With any other a part of the mortgage – as much as 5.2 million euros, liabilities to the Nationwide Earnings Company, “Toro Vehicles”, “Eurolease Auto”, “Synthetika” and people were repaid. Buses have been purchased with 682,124 euros.
The loans of “Transpekt” have been discussed amongst a number of problematic ones granted via the BBR to important businessmen via the then Minister of Economic system Kiril Petkov. Then there have been hints that the corporate had develop into a part of the portfolio of a a hit businessman, however no direct or oblique connections have been discovered.
Georgi Atanasov said at the telephone for Mediapool that loans to BBR are incessantly serviced. The compensation plan supplies for per 30 days bills of 83,000 euros on one mortgage and any other 200,000 euros at the different. The massive fee is left for the ultimate installment, which is in 2029. Then 5.8 million should be paid for one mortgage. EUR, and at the different – 3.7 mln. euro. Alternatively, this may occasionally possibly now not be an issue, as a result of judging via previous observe, it is extremely most probably that this quantity will probably be refinanced thru a brand new mortgage or rescheduled.
Union Ivconi’s revenues were rising over the last 3 years. From 33 mln. BGN in 2021 exceed 47.3 million BGN in 2023, the corporate’s monetary statements display. After two years of loss, in 2023 the corporate made a benefit of two million BGN About 560 staff paintings for the corporate.
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