Worldwide Flight Services (WFS), a SATS company, has opened a 25,400 m² cargo terminal at Lyon-Saint Exupéry Airport (LYS), centralising its Lyon operations on a single site directly connected to the airport's runways and becoming the handler's second-largest operation in France after Paris Charles de Gaulle.

The Aéroport de Lyon DC1 facility sits at the heart of the airport's Cargoport zone and was delivered through a collaboration between Aéroports de Lyon, WFS, Prologis and the em2c Group, which handled design, build and technological oversight as developer and contractor.

The terminal now serves all 380 WFS customers in the Lyon area. The handler expects the facility to sustain more than 300 direct and indirect jobs locally.

For shippers and forwarders moving temperature-sensitive freight, the capacity numbers stand out: 4,400 m² of cold rooms for specialised and sensitive cargo, storage capacity geared to perishables, and 36 door docks for import and export handling — five of them dedicated to air freight pallet transfers. The building's layout is designed to optimise flows between landside access points, handling areas and airside operations.

WFS has positioned the site squarely at the healthcare, pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors, reflecting the high concentration of life-sciences companies in the Lyon region. That pitch matters commercially: pharma and healthcare cargo commands premium handling requirements, and a purpose-built cold-chain facility strengthens the handler's ability to win airline and forwarder contracts in a high-value segment.

Sustainability features were built in from the design stage. The terminal targets a 'Very Good' BREEAM rating, and its roof is solar-ready, engineered to accommodate a future photovoltaic installation.

"Aéroport de Lyon DC1 represents a new milestone for WFS in Lyon, where we first commenced operations in 1971," said Laurent Bernard, Vice-President of WFS France. "Its design, temperature-controlled areas, and organisation of cargo flows enable us to strengthen our capacity and operational efficiency to handle sensitive and high value goods for our airline and freight forwarder customers. Given Lyon's strategically important location, industrial base, and high-value economic sectors, this new generation of logistics infrastructure reinforces Lyon's position in national and European logistics flows and will strengthen the economic attractiveness of the region."

Vincent Sadé, Vice President, Head of Capital Deployment France at Prologis, framed the project as a shift in how logistics real estate serves cargo operators. "Aéroport de Lyon DC1 illustrates how our business is evolving: beyond the building itself, we design infrastructure that is directly integrated into our customers' operations. Our role was to align the specific constraints of the airport environment, real estate requirements and WFS's operational needs to create a tailored, high-performing solution built to last," he said.

Yvan Patet, President of the em2c Group, emphasised the environmental ambition shared by the partners: "The Aéroport de Lyon DC1 project stems from a shared vision among regional and international partners driven by a desire to strengthen the region by incorporating environmental performance from the construction phase onwards. This facility provides a solution tailored to the specific requirements of air freight."

Cedric Fechter, Chairman of the Management Board of Aéroports de Lyon, noted the terminal extends the airport's freight ambitions. "The Aéroport de Lyon DC1 facility marks the continued expansion of Cargoport, the freight zone at Lyon-Saint Exupéry Airport and France's second largest air cargo hub. The result of close collaboration between Prologis, the em2c Group, WFS and Aeroports de Lyon, this project epitomises regional supply chain and significantly strengthens the competitiveness of the region," he said.

The Lyon opening is the latest new-build cargo terminal in the combined SATS and WFS global network, which now operates more than 215 stations across 27 countries, covering trade routes responsible for over 50 percent of global air cargo volume. With pharma-grade cold-chain capacity now consolidated at a single runway-connected site, WFS has laid the groundwork to capture further growth in one of Europe's densest life-sciences cargo markets.