EU clears Lisbon light rail contract after CRRC dropped from bid over Chinese subsidies

In March 2025, Metropolitano de Lisboa published a tender for roughly 450 million euros to build the Violet line. After bids failing to meet the budget, the tender was revised with a budget of 600 million euros and was published a month later in April 2025.

The 11.5km Violet line is planned to begin in Loures, connect with the yellow line at Odivelas, and continue further to Hospital Beatriz Ângelo. The tender includes 12 light rail vehicles and three years of maintenance.

The new bids included FCC, Teixeria Duarte, MasterStyle and Mota-Engil, with subcontractor CRRC. The Mota-Engil consortium was the lowest bid out of the four. An investigation was launched on 5 November 2025 into Mota-Engil's bid under the Foreign Subsidies Regulation (FSR), which came into effect on 13 July 2023. Chinese rolling-stock manufacturer, CRRC, was found to have an unfair advantage because of foreign subsidies. The Mota-Engil consortium was permitted to swap CRRC for Polish rolling-stock manufacturer, SEPA, and continue the bid.

Given this was the first time FSR conditions were applied and used in a public tender, it will be interesting to see what precedents this sets for the future. Also worth reading is Dan Jensen's analysis of the decision, titled The Lisbon FSR ruling was never about the price.