Solaris Bus & Coach

Solaris Bus & Coach S.A. is a bus, coach and trolleybus manufacturer based in Bolechowo and Środa Wielkopolska, near Poznań, Poland.

It is a family-owned business, with Krzysztof Olszewski as chairman and his wife Solange as deputy chairman responsible for contacts with clients. It is located in a former weapons factory, and was featured by BBC World in a program related to EU expansion in May 2004, as an example of a post-communist success in Poland.Fact|date=February 2007

History

Solaris started as Neoplan Polska, founded in 1994 by Krzysztof Olszewski. Neoplan Polska was selling, and since March 1996 also building under German licence, low-floor Neoplan city buses. In 1999 it released first buses under its own Solaris brand (model Urbino). On 1 September 2001 Neoplan Polska was renamed to Solaris Bus & Coach Sp. z o.o. In 2005 it was transformed into joint stock company.

In the 1990s, the company developed its own research office and used computer software originally developed for the design of space shuttles. It reduced the time needed to design and build new prototypes to about six months. Another six months are needed to build a new bus prototype.

Solaris is one of the newest players in the European bus market, but already quite successful: Solaris has received awards for their products in Kortrijk Bus World show in Belgium. Trolleybuses are made in co-operation with the Hungarian company Ganz Electro or (the Czech division of) the company Cegelec. Both companies make the electric devices for the vehicles. Solaris produced the first European bus model using hybrid technology, the "Solaris Urbino 18 Hybrid". That hybrid model was ordered a few months ago by the Polish city of Poznań.

In 2007 Solaris was employing about 1,200 workers. Now "Solaris Bus & Coach" builds 600-700 buses a year.

Sales

Solaris has sold diesel and CNG-powered buses to numerous cities in Europe, and trolleybuses to Italy (Rome and Naples), France (Paris, Bayonne and Narbonne), Denmark, Sweden (Landskrona), Germany (Berlin), Lithuania (Kaunas and Vilnius), Latvia (Riga), Estonia (Tallinn), Switzerland (Winterthur and La Chaux-de-Fonds), Hungary (Budapest and Debrecen), Czech Republic (Opava and Ostrava), Poland (Lublin, Gdynia , Poznań and Tychy).

Products

* Alpino - citybus
* Urbino - citybus
* Urbino Low Entry - citybus
* Valletta - citybus
* Vacanza - coach
* Trollino - trolleybus

External links

* [http://www.solarisbus.pl/ Official site] (Polish, English, German, Russian) — requires Macromedia Flash Player for actual content