CMI Group creates Cockerill Campus, an international training centre in Lorraine (France)
November 10th 2014
In the Meuse department of France, CMI Group is installing its new international training centre designed to support its growth. By 2017, the Cockerill Campus will provide an up to the minute infrastructure capable of accommodating and training some 120 course students. It will be used to provide three types of services: internal CMI training, training destined for clients of CMI and seminars or training sessions which local companies or public bodies may wish to organize.
The Cockerill Maintenance & Ingénierie Group (CMI) is an equipment supplier active in the domains of Energy, Industry, Environment, Defence and Services. Guided by an ambitious strategic project, CMI is seeing strong growth based on the geographical and technological expansion of its activities. To support this growth, the Group has decided to create a training infrastructure with an international vocation. It has a number of requirements: to integrate new employees, develop the skills of its management and technicians, improve knowledge of languages and management training, better bind the teams together, develop a common culture and tools and share knowledge of new technologies and new markets. Going beyond these internal requirements, CMI is being increasingly called upon to develop a training service for its clients.
With 1,100 members of staff based in France, CMI has decided to make use of its strong regional presence in order to invest in Lorraine. Known as the Cockerill Campus, its new international training centre will be located at Commercy on the site of the ‘Oudinot district’, occupied until 2013 by the 8th Artillery Regiment of the French Army. By selecting this location, CMI is contributing to converting a site vacated by the French Army, to creating new direct and indirect employment allied to the operation of the centre, and to making available to local companies or public bodies a training facility with the best standards. EDF, which is very active in this region, has already praised this initiative and signalled its interest in it.
Bernard Serin, President of the CMI Group, expresses his thoughts: “The Cockerill Campus forms part of our desire for sustainable growth. In view of the growth in our staff numbers and of the increasing technical nature of our products, we really needed a centre dedicated to training and development, not only of our engineers, managers and technicians, but also of our client-users. Thanks to the support of the local public bodies, we are today happy and proud to be able to develop our Cockerill Campus while at the same time rehabilitating a famous place with so much rich history, and at the same time to contribute to the economic development of the region. The proximity of an important and valued client such as EDF represents an added benefit, as does that of the military manoeuvres camps of the Marne, given that part of the activities of CMI is in Defence”.
In its initial configuration, the Cockerill Campus will be capable of accommodating 120 course delegates. Its architecture and its conception will make of it an up to the minute training infrastructure: it will be equipped with classic course rooms, digital simulation rooms, workshops, storage areas, and also with quality residential accommodation, with all the facilities to be expected from a top class residence: sports rooms, leisure areas…
The project schedules the rehabilitation of the existing buildings on the one hand, and the construction of new infrastructures on the other. The works, which will be undertaken with the support of local Meuse companies, will start at the beginning of 2015. This substantial project should lead to the gradual creation of direct and indirect employment on the site and in the Commercy basin. The Cockerill Campus should be ready to receive its first training personnel in 2016 and its first course delegates in 2017.
Amongst the first users of the site in 2017 will be the users of CMI Defence systems, within the framework of a long term contract obtained by CMI in 2014.
The Cockerill Campus: key facts
- 10 hectare site
- 29,700 m² of buildings, of which 14,000 m² are new
- Capacity to accommodate around 120 course delegates
- Open to CMI and to private and public users
- Renovation works carried out with a contribution from Meuse companies
- Start of works in January 2015
- Site fully operational in 2017