Helrom to be liquidated after second insolvency in five months
FREIGHT: Helrom, the German startup behind the only commercially validated terminal-free trailer wagon system in Europe, is to be liquidated after filing for insolvency a second time. The company received EUR 15m in federal subsidies and ran daily block trains for Audi before its financial position made continuation impossible.
Employees were informed on 29 May, Deutsche Verkehrs-Zeitung reported. Trains had reportedly stood idle for at least a week before the announcement. Continuation of the business is not economically viable, the publication said.
The collapse follows a restructuring that lasted less than five months. Helrom completed its first insolvency in January under new majority owner HRG, an investor group that included the company’s own co-founders, which injected fresh capital and established a new holding structure.
The technology and the company
Helrom was founded in 2017 by Roman Noack, a former DB Cargo executive, and Keith Heller, former chief executive of British freight operator EWS. The company developed a patented hydraulic wagon system that allows standard semitrailers to be loaded from the side onto rail without crane equipment or fixed terminal infrastructure — a process taking around two minutes per wagon.
The wagons, manufactured by Greenbrier Europe, were financed through asset-backed loans from Greenbrier, Deutsche Anlagen-Leasing and Société Générale. The German federal transport ministry provided EUR 15m in grants under its Zukunft Schienengüterverkehr programme at the market launch in 2023.
Its main revenue service was a daily Audi block train between Regensburg and Lébény in Hungary — the first proof that the system could operate at scale.
First insolvency and the insider rescue
Helrom filed for preliminary insolvency in July 2025 after a planned equity round failed to materialise. Chief executive Noack told DVZ the company had encountered a shortfall in shareholder equity. The wagon financing — loans totalling EUR 67.4m from Greenbrier, Deutsche Anlagen-Leasing and Société Générale — was in place. It was the equity that did not arrive.
The restructuring concluded in January 2026 under new majority owner HRG, Helrom Holding Limited, represented by Heller, Thomas W. Rissman, Albert Enste and Noack. HRG injected fresh capital described as a double-digit million euro amount; the precise figure was not disclosed.
The Audi corridor was suspended during the restructuring period when DB’s Generalsanierung closed the Nuremberg–Regensburg line from 6 February to 10 July 2026.
Patents and wagons to be realised under liquidation
The patents and wagon fleet now pass to an insolvency administrator for realisation. Whether a buyer emerges — and whether the next owner can resolve the financing problem Helrom never could — remains open.