Roco

Roco, based in Salzburg, Austria, is a manufacturer of model railway equipment.

This article is about the model company. For the art museum in Rochester, see Rochester Contemporary Art Center.
For the NBA player, see Robert Covington.

History

The company was founded in 1960 by Ing. Heinz Rössler and started with a plastic Minitanks series of military vehicles. After export to the USA became successful, the model line was expanded with model trains in HO scale and the smaller N scale. TT scale was also subsequently added to the product line. The model rail product line covers many European countries including Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, Spain, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, Sweden and the Netherlands, and also the USA. In the mid 1970s, Lionel HO trains were produced by Roco and Athearn before moving production to the Far East by 1978.

On July 15, 2005 ROCO Modellspielwaren GmbH was declared bankrupt. From July 25 the company continued as Modelleisenbahn GmbH, but still using the Roco brand and associated logo.

On October 1, 2007, distribution of the 'Minitank' product series was assigned to the German model car manufacturer Herpa.

Since February 2008 Modelleisenbahn also owns Fleischmann, which like Roco had gone bankrupt.[1] The two companies continue as separate brands under Modelleisenbahn GmbH, while benefiting from economies of scale through joined development projects, marketing and procurement.[2]

In August 2017 the two companies were put up for sale by Modelleisenbahn GmbH.[3]

  • DSB N 202
  • M61 019
  • DR BR 132 201-5
  • DB BR 290 193-2
  • DB E 144
  • MAV 480 001

References
  1. mremag.com News Service Archived 2008-07-04 at the Wayback Machine
  2. (in German) Modelleisenbahn GmbH press release Archived 2009-01-22 at the Wayback Machine, December 2008
  3. (in German) Wer will Roco Fleischmann haben?, August 2017
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