In our unique series, cargo.one Founder & Co-CEO Moritz Claussen hosts rare and revealing chats with visionaries from the logistics world, uncovering their hard-earned advice, valuable insights and personal experiences. Subscribe today!
Our cargo.one:one series kicks off 2025 with energizing thoughts from a key change-maker and leading light of the global air cargo and aviation sectors. In Episode 5, Moritz Claussen chats to Celine Hourcade of SATS Ltd.
With aviation technology in her blood, Celine began an impressive career on the IT side, achieving success with e-ticketing and e-booking. A move to IATA would see her bringing an ambition for problem solving to the air logistics realm: “It's a real community with people that really know each other and can learn and can really collaborate. So it's really that spirit that I like”.
With IATA for some 13 years, Celine recollects “a lot of new things to learn and to drive”. As Head of Cargo Transformation, she was instrumental in bringing to life a raft of e-freight progress. Celine is candid about coming to terms with the size of the challenge: “I had that naivety to think that we could do exactly what we did on the passenger side with cargo and digitalize everything – just like that”. She soon realized that IATA and the industry “needed way more collaboration” to progress what was in fact “not a digitalization project” but a “revolutionary project”.
After looking afresh at digitalization potentials, IATA and the industry “moved away from just replacing a piece of paper with a digital message into changing completely the approach”, and “looking at the concept differently” enabled an acceleration since 2019. Celine notes how digital success requires the necessary space to be born out: “Innovation starts with new ideas being tested in a smaller environment and then when it’s successful, and you learn from that, then you can do a change of the industry standards, but not the other way around. So I feel that we have now changed that dynamic.”
Celine has worked alongside many cutting edge innovators in areas including “drones, IoT, booking platforms, carbon accounting and solutions”. Her passion for digitalization progress would later lead her to start her own management consultancy, Change Horizon, which she ran for five years.
Enjoy the full length episode, here:
Change for good
Celine is also synonymous with sustainability transformation – for example, supporting TIACA for 5 years to create its Sustainability Roadmap, annual survey and BlueSky program. She is candid and pragmatic about how to lobby industry leaders towards more sustainable corporate strategies: “You need to give the right message to the right people, especially the ones that are making decisions. So it's the ‘What's in it for me?’ question. What's in it for you as a human being, as a leader, will it be part of your own legacy?”
With increasing momentum from the regulatory angle, Celine points to a building cascade of sustainability demand across the ecosystem: “Freight forwarders are definitely trying to push, to put more pressure on the airlines and…then the airlines would replicate that pressure on grand handlers, on the airports etc”.
Reflecting on the future, Celine connects sustainability success with the long term futureproofing of the industry: “More and more we need to embed good practice that will make you really proud to be able to attract and retain new talent. So it's also part of the future attractiveness of the industry as an employer of choice.”
“Every door that we opened before is a door that is already open now and that will help any new innovation to really take off. If I don't like something, I don't want to just complain about it. I want to offer a solution!”
Celine Hourcade
Stepping up to transform diversity
Since her time at IATA, Celine remains committed to inspiring and recruiting “new blood and a new generation” into the industry and making “conscious efforts to increase diversity”. Recognizing that “merit is also built with the opportunities you give to people”, in 2021 she co-founded Women in Aviation & Logistics (WAL) to inspire and support young women with better visibility and opportunities: “We managed to make really a lot of women more visible and many of them got promotions, new opportunities to speak at events and be featured in the media …I have really great pride on that”.
Celine is excited about the trajectory of the industry, and is keen to remain active in enhancing aspects for future generations. While she concedes that air cargo is still “not really a speedy industry to embrace change”, Celine rightfully points out that “all the change makers” can therefore be especially “proud of any real achievements that we have because it's not an easy journey.”
Which region of the world wins over Celine as her favorite? Tune into Episode 5 now to find out! 🤩
cargo.one:one features many more exciting guests in the series. If you enjoyed this episode, stay tuned to our blog or subscribe using your favorite podcast platform including Spotify, Apple podcasts, Amazon Music, iHeartRadio, Castbox and more.
