SBB Cargo is a subsidiary of Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) specialising in railfreight and is operated as the Freight division. Swiss Federal Railways is a former state-owned and -controlled company that was transformed in 1999 into a joint-stock company under special legislation following the first Swiss railway reform and divided up into three independent divisions: Passenger, Freight and Infrastructure. The headquarters of Swiss Federal Railways SBB Cargo AG, the Freight division's official designation, are in Olten. In 2013, SBB Cargo had 3,061 employees and achieved consolidated sales of CHF 953 million. In Switzerland, SBB Cargo is the market leader in rail freight, transporting over 175,000 tons of goods every day. This corresponds to the weight of 425 fully loaded jumbo jets.

Alstom Traxx is a modular product platform of mainline diesel-electric and electric locomotives. It was produced originally by Bombardier Transportation and later Alstom, and was built in both freight and passenger variants. The first version was a dual-voltage AC locomotive built for German railways from the year 2000. Later types included DC versions, as well as quadruple-voltage machines, able to operate on most European electrification schemes: 1.5/3.0 kV DC and 15/25 kV AC. The family was expanded in 2006 to include diesel-powered versions. Elements common to all variants include steel bodyshells, two bogies with two powered axles each, three-phase asynchronous induction motors, cooling exhausts on the roof edges, and wheel disc brakes.