Every year, hundreds of thousands of new vehicles cross oceans to reach European roads, making the port of entry a quiet yet critical bridge between automotive production and customer satisfaction. A significant share of all new passenger cars and light commercial vehicles entering the French market transit through a port before reaching dealers and end customers. In this environment, operational excellence has become a critical success factor for automotive manufacturers.
For CEVA Logistics, differentiation extends far beyond ocean freight transportation. It lies in the seamless execution of vehicle logistics operations once the vehicle is discharged from the vessel. From vehicle handling and storage to pre-delivery inspection (PDI), damage prevention, inventory visibility and final distribution, every stage of the process contributes to protecting vehicle quality and delivering superior customer experience.
What makes CEVA Logistics unique is its ability to provide a fully integrated door-to-door solution through its own network of assets and operations.
This approach gives CEVA Logistics complete control over the vehicle distribution chain, minimizing handovers and reducing operational risks. This unique capability allows automotive manufacturers to improve service consistency, accelerate time-to-market and protect their brand reputation.
"Today, vehicle logistics is no longer just about moving cars from one location to another. It is about protecting the customer experience and the manufacturer's brand at every step of the journey," explains Sébastien Roger, CEVA’s Managing Director of Finished Vehicle Logistics in France.
A vehicle may be engineered in Germany, assembled in China, and sold to a driver in France—yet the true success of that global journey hinges on the crucial days it spends at a vehicle logistics hub.
Once discharged from a RoRo vessel, every vehicle enters a highly coordinated process involving customs clearance, technical inspections, quality checks, storage management, charging operations for electric vehicles, pre-delivery preparation and final distribution planning. While largely invisible to the end customer, these activities have a direct impact on lead time, vehicle quality, dealer readiness and ultimately customer satisfaction.
This critical port-to-dealer transition is where CEVA Logistics has chosen to differentiate itself.
As the largest France-based logistics company and a global leader in Finished Vehicle Logistics (FVL), CEVA Logistics handled more than 5.5 million vehicles worldwide in 2024. The company combines global scale with over 70 years of automotive expertise inherited from GEFCO, which joined the CMA CGM Group in 2022.
France: A Strategic Gateway for Vehicle Distribution
France occupies a unique position within the European automotive ecosystem. It is simultaneously a major vehicle production country, one of Europe's largest consumer markets and a strategic gateway connecting Overseas destinations and Mediterranean trade corridors.
For automotive manufacturers, French ports are far more than points of entry and exit; they are essential nodes where vehicles are transferred between maritime, rail and road transport networks before reaching national dealer networks.
To support this flow, CEVA has developed an extensive automotive infrastructure across the country.
In April 2024, the company inaugurated a dedicated Finished Vehicle Logistics hub at the Port of Dunkirk the latest addition to a port network that already includes Le Havre and Marseille. The 9.5-hectare facility, equipped with a direct rail connection, provides annual handling capacity for approximately 47,000 vehicles.
Complementing these port operations, CEVA's network of 12 industrial vehicle logistics platforms offers a storage capacity of up to 90,000 vehicles, while supporting operations for several major multinational automotive manufacturers across France. These strategic facilities are supported by a global network of around 130 compounds and proximity centers, providing comprehensive automotive logistics coverage across key markets worldwide.
Vehicle Compounds: Where Value Is Added
Modern vehicle compounds are dynamic, value-added processing hubs rather than static parking lots. They serve as critical transformation centers where imported units are prepared to become retail-ready products. It is a value-added processing center where vehicles are transformed from imported units into retail-ready products.
Services typically range from pre-delivery inspection (PDI) and accessory installation to mechanical, cosmetic and body shop repairs, alongside battery management and EV charging, software updates, and the vehicle preparation, cleaning and quality checks that leave every car maintenance-ready for the road. As a result, a vehicle can arrive directly from a vessel and leave the facility fully prepared for dealership delivery.
For OEMs, this centralized approach significantly reduces handovers throughout the supply chain, minimizes vehicle handling risks and accelerates time-to-market.
The increasing share of battery electric vehicles has added further complexity to these operations. CEVA has invested heavily in EV-ready infrastructure, including large-scale charging capabilities across its compounds and the deployment of fully electric car transporters operating from its vehicle platforms.
The Competitive Advantage of an Integrated Automotive Network
According to Mert Kalyon, CEVA’s Head of Business Development for Finished Vehicle Logistics in France, the key differentiator in today's automotive logistics market is no longer simply network size, but the ability to propose a genuine door-to-door solution, controlling and synchronizing every transport mode throughout the distribution chain.
CEVA offers OEMs an integrated multimodal solution that combines deep-sea and short-sea maritime transport with port operations and customs clearance, extending through vehicle compounds into rail and road distribution and on to last-mile delivery.
Through a long-term agreement with its parent company, the CMA CGM Group, CEVA operates ten LNG dual-fuel deep-sea RoRo vessels, each capable of transporting approximately 7,000 vehicles. This represents roughly 400,000 vehicles of annual maritime capacity under CEVA's commercial control.
In a market where many logistics providers remain dependent on external shipping capacity, this vertical integration provides manufacturers with greater supply chain resilience, improved visibility and enhanced operational flexibility.
"In the Finished Vehicle Logistics industry, the logistics service provider plays a critical role in protecting the brand image and reputation of the car manufacturer it serves. The right logistics partner plays a fundamental role in ensuring that vehicle quality is maintained at every stage of the journey, while delivering a seamless and consistent customer experience that reflects the standards and values of the brand." Mert Kalyon – Head of Business Development, FVL, France, CEVA Logistics
