Focus areas

Group objectives

  • Market-leading positions on specific major European transport corridors
  • Resilient, competitive and predictable intermodal offerings to a growing customer base
  • Ensuring efficient and competitive rail traction capacity with a balanced portfolio of strategic partners
  • Digital transformation and automation in planning and operations along the intermodal chain, including customers, railway undertakings and third party terminals
  • R&D: continuous development of innovations in wagon technology and terminals
  • Increasing the productivity of intermodal and terminal operations

Market development

  • Focus on the intermodal transport segments of transalpine, long haul (over 600 km in Europe) and maritime transport
  • 30-50% market share on the corridors served
  • Focus on pipeline development with 5-10 and more roundtrips per week
  • Capacity utilisation of trains above 80%
  • Priority on the use of own terminals
  • Strengthening the main transport corridors by investing in terminals

Customers

  • Quality, reliability, stability, cost leadership and competitiveness are the key drivers
  • Automate the contract-to-cash process
  • Standardise digital services and set up a self-service platform for customers
  • ‘Estimated pick-up time’ information for 100% of shipments, with 95% reliability
  • Expand customer base; service for major customers
 

Partners

  • Integrate the planning cycle with strategic partners

  • Establish strong partnerships with multiple rail operators
  • Standardise and automate the purchase-to-payment process with partners
  • Strengthen the digitalisation of operational processes (timetables, disruptions, pick-up times, etc.)
 

Employees

  • Develop young talents into leadership positions
  • Increase the diversity of the workforce, particularly in leadership and management positions
  • Reduce staff turnover in the Group
  • HR leadership development program for 2nd/3rd level managers

Contact

Open letter from the industry: Save Combined Transport!

Seven leading companies and associations in the rail freight sector – Hupac, Kombiverkehr, TX Logistik, ERFA, UIRR, SGKV and Fermerci – have sent an open letter to Federal Minister of Transport Patrick Schnieder and DB CEO Evelyn Palla on 29 October 2025.

 

Under the motto “Save Combined Transport”, the signatories warn of an increasing shift of freight traffic from rail back to road.

 

This shift has already begun and is well documented. Its cause lies in the insufficient performance of the rail infrastructure. Over the coming years, we expect – as a result of the planned corridor renovations in Germany that largely disregard industrial supply requirements – hundreds of thousands of additional truck journeys.

On the major Alpine corridors through Austria and Switzerland alone, this would mean around 500,000 extra trucks on the roads, with corresponding increases in emissions, congestion and accident risk.

Without immediate countermeasures, Europe risks losing transport capacity, competitiveness and climate progress. We therefore call for:

  • A freeze on track access charges for 2026
  • A capacity guarantee of at least 90% during corridor renovations
  • Upgrading of suitable diversion routes
  • Train path allocation according to market needs
  • Compensation for operational restrictions on inferior routes
  • Suspension of cancellation fees

 

Check the Open Letter in the Download section.

Download