German industrial giant Siemens A.G. said on Thursday it was confident a deal could be reached with China to extend a high-speed magnetic rail line, but it did not say when an agreement would be signed.

"I am very confident that we will come to a (positive) conclusion," Richard Hausmann, chief executive of Siemens' operations in China, told Reuters in an interview.

"We are negotiating very intensively, but I can not say when" a deal would be reached, said Hausmann.

Siemens and German steel firm ThyssenKrupp A.G. are leading a consortium that wants to extend a magnetic levitation train track at Shanghai by 160 km (100 miles) to Hangzhou.

Earlier this month, German media reported that the project could be scrapped. Many believe the snags hinge on technology transfer agreements that the Chinese are insisting on.

Hausmann said the Chinese government needed to make a decision soon if it wanted to have the rail link running in time for the 2010 World Expo in Shanghai.

The current 30 km track links Shanghai's airport and the city centre. In 2003, China became the first country in the world to get such a train, which travels up to 430 km an hour.

The German company also expects trials for a Chinese standard for third generation (3G) wireless telecommunications network to be completed by July, after which, if successful, licences could be issued.

Siemens has formed a joint venture with China's largest telecommunications gear maker, Huawei Technologies Co, to develop TD-SCDMA technology.

Telecoms companies like Motorola and Nokia could be in line for large pieces of an estimated $12 billion in orders for network gear when the licences are issued, which many expect to be in the second half of this year.

Nokia and Siemens just days ago formed the world's fourth-biggest telecoms infrastructure company in a tie-up worth up to some 30 billion euros (US$38 billion).

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