Maritime freight carrier CMA CGM today inaugurated a center for training and innovation, saying the new “Tangram” unit will host over 3,000 of its employees per year.
Located in Marseilles, France, Tangram will serve as a “laboratory for innovation” within CMA CGM and as a center for studying major contemporary trends and for envisioning the future of sustainable transportation and logistics, the company said.
According to the French company, the unit is designed to address four major challenges facing the transport and logistics sectors today: environmental, technological, geopolitical, and economic. To do so, Tangram will create a rich ecosystem and develop synergies between experts from all backgrounds in the world of supply chain, including both employees of the CMA CGM Group and also clients and partners, large companies, startups, universities, and research centers.
The center is housed in a 90,000-square foot facility located in the 8th “arrondissement” of Marseille, at the heart of the Ecole Nationale Supérieure Maritime, on the doorstep of the Calanques National Park. The site is designed to foster meetings and innovation, with training rooms, immersive experiences, navigation simulators, an innovation hub, and an event space. It also hosts innovative technologies including an avatar created from artificial intelligence, virtual reality immersion to explore key professions in transport and logistics, and an animated 3D model to discover future innovations within the CMA CGM Group.
Attendees from CMA CGM will be able to choose between three training programs co-created with universities such as BCG University, Imperial College London, and HEC Paris: "climate," "artificial intelligence," and "leadership." Each program begins with a ten-hour distance learning phase, followed by a week-long immersive training session on site, including practical case studies and specific modules designed by Tangram and its partner universities. Accommodating up to 120 learners, each session will also allow everyone to interact with colleagues from various countries, professions, and CMA CGM divisions.
The CMA CGM Group serves more than 420 ports around the world with a fleet of around 620 vessels. In 2023, it carried a total of 21.8 million TEU (twenty-foot equivalent unit) containers. The company includes its subsidiary CEVA Logistics, a global logistics provider that delivered 522,000 tonnes of air cargo and more than 22 million tonnes of inland freight cargo, and its CMA CGM Air Cargo division. Overall, the group spans more than 400 offices and 750 warehouses, employing 180,000 people worldwide.
