Once viewed with suspicion, the French market is now favored by DHL Express. With the upcoming launch of a new sorting platform at Lyon airport, the express carrier is about to complete an investment cycle of 420 million euros started before the health crisis. The express carrier thus believes that it is ready to absorb the growth of its activity in France until 2040.
According to Philippe Prétat, CEO of DHL Express France, there are not many countries in Europe where his group has invested more than in France over the last six years. He thus welcomes the current cycle marked by two major projects: the new platforms at Paris-CDG airport, opened in 2021 with an investment of 170 million euros, and at Lyon-Saint-Exupéry airport, which will open its doors in July 2025 with 121 million euros spent. 15 other smaller projects were carried out in parallel.
Parcel delivery: why DHL is reinjecting 121 million euros into its Lyon Saint-Exupéry hub
French catch-up
“There is a phenomenon of catching up compared to previous years when the group was rather reluctant to invest in France”nevertheless concedes Philippe Prétat. France thus regains a place of choice in DHL Express' strategy alongside Italy, the United Kingdom, Belgium and Germany.
“In complete transparency, the episode of the sale of the messaging activity (operation which cost DHL Express 260 million euros a few years after its purchase, editor's note.) and the large investments made around twenty years ago years, had cooled the group a little on investments. France was a country where investments were rather low,” explains Philippe Prétat.
This responds to strong growth in the French market since the end of the 2010s. Its flows have increased by 15% between 2019 and 2024, where 46 million parcels should be processed. After a peak in 2021 followed by a small decline, the market has tended to stabilize for two years. Turnover last year was around 800 million euros for 50 million euros in operating profit.
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Like the DHL group (all activities combined), which plans a 50% growth in its turnover worldwide by 2030 to reach 120 billion euros, Philippe Prétat is also targeting development of the French market. . It therefore forecasts between 3 and 5% average annual growth over the period, which should keep it almost at the level of the rest of the group. This should make it possible to generate around 300 hires per year. But he warns that the market is difficult.
“In terms of capacity, we are ready until 2040. Now, my problem is more to find volumes to fill the sorting machines”, declares the boss of DHL Express France to The Tribune.
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New sectors
To achieve this, it will have to find new growth drivers. In recent years, this has relied heavily on the emergence of B2C activity. Until then focused on B2B flows, DHL Express saw its activity towards individuals develop in the 2010s then take off during Covid. The acceleration is particularly visible in France: while they represented only 2% of the total volume transported in 2010, parcel imports linked to e-commerce increased to 38% in 2019 and 45% in 2020. But since then, they stabilize around this level, somewhat lower than expectations.
Faced with this plateau, Philippe Prétat explains that DHL Express is seeking to develop new, very specific sectors of activity. He cites life sciences and health, in particular temperature-controlled means of transport, new energies, for example battery transport which requires specific safety measures, or even digitalization.
Auvergne Rhône-Alpes, a “key location” for DHL
The second most important site in the country in terms of international air flows and 4th in Europe for road transport, the AuRA region benefits from a strategic and geographical positioning which places it at the crossroads of several European routes. And in fact “a key place” for DHL Express France, confirms Philippe Prétat, its president.
Its importance is reflected in the volumes operated on the site: 20% of the group's French volumes pass through there, with faster growth than in the rest of the territory. Hence DHL's ambition to strengthen its positioning and processing capacity at its Lyon site, located near Lyon Saint-Exupéry airport.
If until now 38,000 parcels were processed daily on the Lyon platform, and up to 45,000 during the holiday period, the new sorting line should boost this capacity to 17,500 parcels sorted per hour from 2025. That is ten times more than the current cadence. A modernization which alone represents 31 million euros of investments out of the 121 million euros committed by the group on this site.
Anne Taffin
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