Émilie Brot, Managing Director of the Plaine de l’Ain Industrial Park: “It can sometimes be difficult to convey logistics’ strengths”
The Plaine de l’Ain Industrial Park (PIPA) was born from the vision of around 30 elected officials in the 1960s. Balancing planning with responses to historical circumstances, PIPA was built around an ambition and today hosts nearly 200 companies, representing 8 000 jobs, including more than 3 500 in the pure logistics sector. Interview with Émilie Brot, the Park’s Managing Director since 2022.
Conceived in the 1960s but actually created in the 1970s, PIPA is now a major player in the Rhône-Alpes region’s economy. What were the different stages in its development ?
Émilie Brot: Three historical events gave rise to the creation of the Plaine de l’Ain Industrial Park. In the 1960s, France experienced unprecedented population growth, and the government was concerned that the population would become concentrated solely in major cities. It therefore considered creating new towns outside the main urban areas. This was a time of organized development and planning. However, elected officials from the municipalities of the Plaine de l’Ain strongly opposed the plan, believing that the best form of rural development at the time was to develop human-scale hubs.
At the same time, the Bugey nuclear power plant, located in Saint-Vulbas, was being built. For elected officials in the surrounding municipalities, while this facility was good news, it was also necessary to anticipate its eventual closure and therefore not focus all investment on this single type of industry. Activities needed to be diversified.
Finally, the Feyzin refinery disaster in 1966 convinced public decision-makers to establish an industrial zone capable of accommodating chemical and petrochemical activities, sufficiently far from the major city. Located 30 km from Lyon and 25 km from the future “Satolas” airport, the PIPA site, close to a brand-new nuclear power plant, seemed ideally suited: close to pipelines, rail links, and future major highways.
In 1974, the development zone was created, and in 1976 the joint authority established to manage it came into being.
What does logistics represent for PIPA today ?
É.B.: Of the 188 companies located at PIPA, 73 operate in industry and 27 in logistics. Yet the employment generated by these two activities is comparable: industry employs 3,722 people, while logistics employs 3 554. Relative to the number of establishments, the difference is significant. Industry averages 51 jobs per company, compared with 132 for logistics. In other words, logistics at PIPA has a particularly high jobs-per-establishment ratio, contrary to some still widespread perceptions. Nevertheless, this reality remains difficult to have recognized in economic development policies. Yet it must be assessed in light of logistics’ structuring role for industrial companies already located at the Park, which directly depend on it for their flows and competitiveness. Despite this, PIPA has not welcomed any new “external” logistics companies for several years, notably because of the sometimes tarnished image that still affects the sector.
How do you decide whether or not to welcome a company ?
É.B.: It is all about balance. Since PIPA’s inception, we have sought a mix of activities, jobs, and related skills. Our revenue comes from selling the Park’s land—1,000 hectares—which enables us to manage infrastructure, roads, water, sanitation, lighting, green-space maintenance, economic development programming, and even a railway line ! After 50 years in operation, we still have 160 hectares to market, and we continue to seek a balance between a “controlled” sales pace and the different sectors we host.
While we are not currently accepting any new so-called “external” logistics companies, we continue to support those already present, such as INTERSPORT and the SPI Group, which inaugurated a state-of-the-art facility at PIPA in 2025 to manage the logistics of certain Nestlé products. BREEAM “Excellent” certified, the platform features cutting-edge systems that improve energy efficiency while minimizing the activity’s environmental footprint (a next-generation air diffuser and a solar power plant paired with batteries, providing 70% energy self-consumption), as well as exemplary HR policies… These are excellent showcases for convincing those who may be reluctant to see logistics come to their area.
What other steps are you taking to change their view of logistics ?
É.B.: To counter preconceived notions, it is essential to make things objective and quantify them : the number of jobs created, the types of jobs and their qualification levels, the aesthetics of the buildings, the site’s landscape integration, its modernity, its measured environmental impact, its level of automation, the investment involved, etc. A building lease (see the article we published on this topic in Plateformes Magazine, editor’s note), which enables local authorities to retain control of the land, could also be a solution for these projects. In any case, we are exploring this issue.
Regarding human resources, how do you attract the skills needed for the activities of the Park’s companies ?
É.B.: It all starts with students. They tend to begin working where they studied. Many train in Lyon or Bourg-en-Bresse. Together with the PIPA Business Club, we have therefore worked to open programs better tailored to the needs of our companies within the schools located in our area. For example, in 2020, three qualifications were created : a vocational certificate in logistics operations, a vocational high-school diploma in logistics, and a vocational high-school diploma in freight transport. We also face a need for maintenance professionals, whom all companies require, especially with the growth of automation. A two-year technical degree program is also expected to be launched this year. But all of this takes time to put in place...
