Toulonruns on a handful of strong industries. If you’re job-hunting or weighing a move, here’s where the opportunities (and the big-name employers) are.
Top industries & employers
Defence & naval
Base navale de Toulon, Naval Group, Exail, Thales, DGA Essais de missiles
The French Navy's principal base and the largest military port in Europe, home to the Charles de Gaulle carrier group and a very large share of the fleet's tonnage — and the largest single employer in the Var by a wide margin.
Shipbuilding & marine engineering
CNIM Les Mureaux–La Seyne, Monaco Marine, Piriou, ship repair yards at Brégaillon
Naval construction and repair is concentrated in the Var to an extent unmatched elsewhere in the region, with the La Seyne and Brégaillon yards the industrial heart of the western side of the bay.
Marine science & subsea technology
Ifremer Méditerranée (La Seyne), Pôle Mer Méditerranée, Exail, Université de Toulon marine institutes
Ifremer's main Mediterranean site sits on the bay alongside a national competitiveness cluster for maritime technology, giving the area a genuine research base in subsea robotics, oceanography and sensing.
Higher education & research
Université de Toulon, SeaTech engineering school, Institut Méditerranéen d'Océanologie
A smaller university than Marseille's or Nice's, deliberately specialised toward the sea, engineering and information science, with campuses at La Garde and in the city.
Tourism, ferries & the coast
Corsica Ferries, Toulon–Hyères airport, Îles d'Hyères operators, TPM tourism
Toulon is a working ferry port for Corsica and Sardinia and the mainland gateway to Porquerolles and Port-Cros — a seasonal economy that is large, real, and concentrated between May and September.
Public sector & health
Préfecture du Var, Métropole TPM, CHITS (Hôpital Sainte-Musse), Hôpital d'instruction des armées Sainte-Anne
As the préfecture of the Var, Toulon carries the usual regional-capital administrative weight, plus a large military teaching hospital that is unusual for a city this size.
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