
L.A. Company Wins China Hyperloop Deal - kungfudoi
https://www.wsj.com/articles/l-a-company-wins-china-hyperloop-deal-1532087032
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throw_awy_1
Very cool to see this technology progress. Will be interesting to track. China
certainly has shown that it both can invest in and build public infrastructure
at an amazing scale and pace.

It's a little concerning that this isn't really a sale - it's a joint venture.
From the article:

"HyperloopTT will form a joint venture with the Tongren authorities, according
to the Guizhou provincial government, though the company’s announcement didn’t
say whether it would be expected to transfer technology."

Has to be taken with a bit of caution as we've seen how this worked out in
high speed rail:

"China's early high-speed trains were imported or built under technology
transfer agreements with foreign train-makers including Alstom, Siemens,
Bombardier and Kawasaki Heavy Industries. Since the initial technological
support, Chinese engineers have re-designed internal train components and
built indigenous trains manufactured by the state-owned CRRC Corporation."
[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-
speed_rail_in_China](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-speed_rail_in_China)]

You'll find that China now is battling for dominance in the global high speed
rail market and the formerly leading European providers (Seimens, Altrom) and
in trouble and may have to merge just to survive.

"European rivals unite as CRRC threatens to corner train market "
[[https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-27/alstom-
si...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-27/alstom-siemens-
forget-high-speed-rail-feud-amid-asian-onslaught)]

[[https://www.credit-suisse.com/corporate/en/articles/news-
and...](https://www.credit-suisse.com/corporate/en/articles/news-and-
expertise/the-market-for-high-speed-trains-stays-the-course-201502.html)]

~~~
_Schizotypy
which part is the interesting technology?

the train or the tunnel?

~~~
JKCalhoun
"Hyper" in the name?

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wpdev_63
While I was traveling in Beijing I remember hearing stories that the Chinese
hired Japanese contractors to build the rail. Had them build one track of the
rail and sent them home. Then they copied their design and built the rest of
the railway.

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seanmcdirmid
Tongren county? That is like out in the middle of nowhere (well, near
fenghuang in hunan) and is only known as a tourist destination for seeing Miao
(Hmong) villagers. Strange.

Backpackers should visit this place, it’s like yangshuo/Lijiang before they
became saturated.

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pixelpp
lol China will steal this company's tech in 3...2...1...

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Leary
Does anyone know why they are building it in a seemingly less populated/
prosperous province?

~~~
ebikelaw
Since the capacity of a Hyperloop system is close to zero (less than 1000
passengers per hour, much less than a lane of highway and two orders of
magnitude less than an ordinary railroad), it doesn't really matter where you
put it.

~~~
DenisM
Should we be comparing it to trains or planes though?

~~~
ebikelaw
Did you mean should we compare it to airports? LAX will land 54 aircraft in
the 60 minutes starting now, and I assure you that amounts to rather more than
1000 pax/hour.

~~~
Retric
LAX is 3,500 acres and only provides 1/2 the land area need for a flight.
Worse you can't build anything tall near by and need all that land close to
cities, making high speed trains a surprisingly good trade-off.

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asdfman123
Wait, the US finally comes up with some new cool mass-transit technology and
we're not even building it here?

Shame.

~~~
meddlepal
We can't build any public infrastructure in the US anymore. Too complicated
between environmental regs, NIMBYism, and corruption.

~~~
curtis
> _We can 't build any public infrastructure in the US anymore._

I know it feels that way, but it's not strictly true. Here in Seattle in the
last decade we've built a new floating bridge, multiple miles of underground
light rail track, and nearly two miles of deep bore road tunnel.

I think there is a real problem that our new infrastructure is way too
expensive and takes way too long to build, but we've demonstrated that we can
definitely build new stuff.

~~~
blackrock
Seattle's light rail is mediocre. I wish they had gone full in with a heavy
rail and subway system instead.

They could've used that to link up Seattle, Tacoma, Redmond, Kent, Bainbridge
Island, Vashon Island, and the entire Seattle area.

And to keep costs of building the infrastructure down, then they should
consider outsourcing it, and hiring Chinese labor. (Apparently, the Chinese
are very good at building railroads.) That way, you keep development costs
down, and afterwards, the local citizens can enjoy first-world infrastructure,
at low rates.

But, when infrastructure projects become billion dollar estimates, then that
just kills any opportunity of it ever being developed. Simply, because it now
becomes a major high-paying jobs program.

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blackrock
This move was very puzzling to me, in light of Trump's trade tactics.
Especially, of his accusations that China "steals" American technology.

So, given this, why would any new American company, choose to enter into a
51/49 partnership with China? Where China has the majority share, and where
the American company must share with their Chinese partner, all the system
processes, techniques, and new technology of their product.

This is just adding fuel to the fire, and the resentment that Americans have
of the Chinese people.

Here, the American company is willingly entering into such a business
agreement. The Chinese side is not holding a gun to the American company's
head.

For the Chinese side, they are investing a lot of money into this research
project, to fund this hare-brained idea. So, there is a lot of risk on their
part, that nothing will emerge from this.

The alternative, is that the American company can just choose not to do it.
Don't accept the money. Go it alone. Don't enter the Chinese market. The rest
of the world is a huge playground as it is.

~~~
imgabe
It's not like the US is investing in rail technology. If we're not going to
build it, China will.

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dghughes
I wonder if this has something to do with the Belt and Road Initiative. A huge
corrupt money sponge.

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dbatten
Paywall work-around: [https://t.co/jZyOpZbbtD](https://t.co/jZyOpZbbtD)

~~~
dbatten
Completely serious question given the downvotes: Is this discouraged or banned
on HN?

Whenever I hit a paywall from an HN link, I immediately go to the comments to
see if somebody has linked to the full article. Thought I'd help folks out
since nobody had done that for this article yet, but if I'm out of line I
won't do it again.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
You might be being downvoted because your link doesn’t avoid the paywall.

~~~
dbatten
Really? Works for me...

That would explain it though.

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benbojangles
Basically means China will learn and develop their own hyperloop technology
based on other's plans.

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Gargoyle
Hacker News has assured me repeatedly that this is an imaginary technology
that cannot possibly work, so I assume this must be fake news.

~~~
cmdli
I think the criticism isn't that it couldn't possibly work, but rather that it
was impractical and expensive. Basically, its the modern monorail.

~~~
arblegobblebrbl
"impractical and expensive" are invalid criticisms in the face of no other
alternatives other than more cars and freeways.

The monorail at Disneyland works great and so does the one in Seattle.

~~~
_Schizotypy
Yea, monorails do work great.

They don't need to be surrounded by a vacuum tube, which is the impractical
and expensive part.

