CNR expects 2011 profit up 50%

BEIJING - China CNR Corporation Limited (CNR), one of China's state-owned train makers, said Friday it expects to see a net profit surge over 50 percent in 2011 from a year earlier, on the country's booming railway and metro construction.

The company's net profit will thus reach around 3 billion yuan ($476.12 million) in 2011, as CNR posted a profit of 1.91 billion yuan in 2010.

The train maker attributed the revenue growth to the "continuously rapid development" of China's railway and urban rail system in 2011, in its statement to the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

The profit estimate came despite the company's recall of a raft of trains after a deadly accident last summer.

On July 23, a high-speed train rammed into a stalled train near the city of Wenzhou in the eastern province of Zhejiang, leaving 40 dead and 191 injured.

The company recalled 54 trains it supplied for the high-speed rail between Beijing and Shanghai three weeks later.

All the trains resumed service in December, after three months of modifications and repeated tests, according to the Ministry of Railways.