Open Modal in exclusive negotiations with SNCF Réseau to acquire rail terminal
French company Open Modal, is understood to be in exclusive negotiations with SNCF Reseau to acquire and modernise the existing road-rail combined transport terminal located at Fenouillet, in proximity to Toulouse. A deal is expected to be reached next year. The project should be making provision for the installation of two new-generation gantry cranes and the decarbonisation of facilities, according to French media, quoting the head of Open Modal group, Jean-Claude Brunier.
However, neither of the parties involved was immediately available to comment when contacted by Railfreight.com.
Heavily subsidised initiative
With a similar project, Open Modal recently commissioned a multi-user, state-of-the-art intermodal hub for swap bodies and containers in Miramas, on the outskirts of Marseille. And like the Miramas terminal, investment is estimated at approximately 40 million euros and is expected to be heavily subsidised, at around 70 per cent. The prospective sources would be the Occitanie public regional authority, in south-west France, the French State, the European Union and the Toulouse metropolitan council.
At Fenouillet, Open Modal will team up with a specialist property developer, as it did for the Miramas terminal.
Combined transport at the centre
This strategy of acquiring previously leased terminals gives Open Modal control of the entire combined transport chain, through several subsidiary companies: TAB Rail Road (road haulage), T3M (combined transport operator), BTM (multimodal terminal operator) and Combirail, a rail company with a fleet of 12 locomotives. The integrated terminals it is developing are open to other combined transport operators. “We need to modernise the existing road/rail terminals, which are almost 50 years old.
Their facilities are obsolete and the gantries are not productive,” Brunier said. With SNCF Reseau already having great difficulty in maintaining its rail network, these ‘combi’ terminals ‘are the only operational solution for decarbonising long-distance overland transport if France is to meet its objectives of tripling combined transport and doubling rail freight by 2030, he observed.
A difficult 2023 for Open Modal
Along with other operators, 2023 was a challenging year for Open Modal with the closure of the France-Italy rail line via Modane, a spate of strikes at SNCF against pension reform and the surge in electricity prices. The group lost around 6 million euros in 2023 from a turnover of 84 million euros, compared to (a turnover) of 98 million euros in 2022.
Fortunately, the financial years during COVID, which saw the group benefit from the severe downturn in road haulage activity, and post-COVID were profitable, Brunier added. Open Modal, which is eyeing a turnover of 100 million euros in 2024, claims to account for one-third of the French market for road-rail general cargo.
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References
- ^ See the offer (www.railfreight.com)