I also struggled on my initial attempt, starting a company normally with $130k personal investment and $1300k investor plus $2M gift, enough money to lay track all the way from Chagyr to Chimkent. But after initially strong returns, the cost of maintenance quickly ate up my profits and I got nowhere close to the gold with just a few years to go, no chance for PNW or supporting my Krasnian friends, and only maybe Silver on hauls to Chimkent.
Well, I followed Joost's advice, only accepting the minimum outside investment of $400k, then building a lumber mill in Chaynabad to catch a stream of logs flowing north. There was a paper mill to the north as well, so prices for pulpwood and logs were already decent and I snatched up 6 or 7 logging camps. Built a paper mill in Chaynabad, then upgraded lumber, then upgraded paper, then build a toy factory in Chaynabad, too. Built a brewery in Timyr on a stack of grain at a bakery.
Finally, in 1932 I started rail service out of Chagyr, and a token spoke out of Chimkent to Ak-Turpak. Only connected Chimkent and Chagyr in 1939, making my way down to Chaynabad vis Pisok first. Profits were up over $4M/year, and I even issued some stock late in the game to hasten a victory, building out east from Chimkent to Iradan then down around to Karym-Baba, mainly for extra express traffic as there was no cargo out there... Also built 18 hotels in Chimkent for good measure, lol! I was worried about making hauls, but was profitable enough to add routes into Chimkent from basically every station on the map, and a bit of that for Chagyr, and was quickly pulling in over 100 loads/year, while still remaining profitable when the economy crashed.
Gave $100k/year, and had two attempts made on me, whew! Needless to say I bought up shares and even bought back shares while price was still low before it could catch up to CBV/share, and quickly had all the shares, so PNW was over $18M before I knew it. Gold on Expert in Nov 1945!
Well, not a perfectly balanced game, would have like to be able to use more of the map profitably, but certainly an engaging challenge. Building up to build in April every year, handicapping production every May-Nov making industries less profitable and cargo harder to come by. The path to staying afloat certainly wasn't dangled out in front of me, I had to work for it!
Oh, and because I love them, and because I wanted to maximize efficiency on what I'd anticipated would be a rather jammed-up network, I ran all E428's when they came out, and ditched my loyal H10's.
How do you guys do it?? I've been playing a couple of times now in expert and never got close to gold. (In fact failed even bronze at the last minute because the AI started dumping my companies' shares, which was fair enough since I sold every industry for a stock buyback. But anyway) Funny is that the only thing that was easy was the donations. Just started with 25K a year and as soon as I (thought I) could afford it spend 100K. No sweat, just one warning somewhere in the 1940's.