SNCF on Wednesday pledged to reinvent the European freight business as the French state-owned rail group unveiled its sixth rescue plan in 12 years for its heavily loss-making goods transport arm.

Guillaume Pepy, chief executive, said SNCF would invest €1bn ($1.5bn) to 2015 in redesigning its freight business, stepping up the number of goods trains and high speed international services, new bigger shuttles and local connections to regions and ports that would make logistics “one of the strong points of France”.