BRITISH WORKS IN SPAIN

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 202, 15 May 1918, Page 5

BRITISH WORKS IN SPAIN

MEW LOCOMOTIVE FACTORY.

I A powerful combination of British and Spanish industrial interests, involving an initial capital of AOOO.OOO, has been completed between Messrs. Babcock ana Wilcox and somo of tho most important industrial forces in tho country, incjuling the Altos Hornos Company of Bilbao, the onlv steel producers in spam (states Mr. Filson Young, in the ' Daily Mail"). Tho principal object of the combination, he says, is tho manufacture of high-class locomotives, marino ana land boilers, unci w>lid drawn tubes on a new principle which will supersede the Mannesmnnn process. Works which will bo by far the largest in Spain will bo ercctcd near Bilbao and (jivo employment to 2000 men. Messrs. Eabcock and Wilcox will undertake the equipment of tho factory with British machinery, and will direct tho technical management until the year 1940. No complcto boilers have hitherto been constructed in Spain, and locomotives havo almost exclusively been imported from Germany, the vnluo imported in 1913 being <£500,000. Although a few liave sinco been imported from the United States at a cost of .{IO,OOO cach, tho transport of the conntry has been practically paralysed for the last year, and a half. This enterprise will make Spain independent of outside supplies for many years to come, and will greatly facilitntethe provision of light railways, which is one of the most urgent of th" country* needs, Flifl Tunc of Spain, who received the managing director of the British company on his recent visit, has takvn a great interest in the combine, which is generally lesnrdcd with enthusiasm as the forerunner of many similar commercial alliances betweoiy the two countries.