Innovation, the hallmark of Spanish ports

• Isabel Pardo de Vera: Ports will have to strengthen collaboration with the Port Community and end customers, offering co-creation spaces for the incubation and acceleration of ideas and projects.
• In total, 130 projects will be financed with €30 million from the Ports 4.0 Fund.

30-11-2022 (Public Body Puertos del Estado). The State-owned port system (46 ports managed by 28 Port Authorities and coordinated by Puertos del Estado) celebrates its 30th anniversary this year. On this occasion, various events have been organized, among which the "Ports 4.0. The ports of the future" innovation day stands out.

More than 500 people, including attendees and online connections, participated in the event, demonstrating the great interest that innovation arouses within the Port Community. It has been a meeting where the Administration, entrepreneurs, and innovation companies have shared interests and debated on the most relevant issues, with ongoing projects and possibilities for new developments taking up most of the day.

The president of Puertos del Estado, Álvaro Rodríguez Dapena, introduced the event by providing an overview of the creation in 2018 and subsequent development of the Ports 4.0 Fund, highlighting the unanimity and support it has garnered from the Port Authorities and the Port Community.

Following this, Isabel Pardo de Vera, Secretary of State for Transport, Mobility, and Urban Agenda of the MITMA, intervened to highlight the government's commitment to strengthen the position of different modes of transport with the aim of sustainable and efficient mobility.

Pardo de Vera cited the Ports 4.0 Fund as an example of this proactive policy, through which ports stimulate and radiate innovation. According to the Secretary of State, Port Authorities will have to strengthen collaboration with the Port Community and end customers, offering co-creation spaces for the incubation and acceleration of new ideas and projects.

Next, José Llorca, head of Innovation at Puertos del Estado, outlined the main data and results of the Ports 4.0 program to date, highlighting the more than 750 applications received from 42 countries, of which 102 have already been selected, and the aim to reach 130 projects funded by the Ports 4.0 Fund at the end of this second call, which will be financed with €18 million, in addition to the €12 million from the first call.

Fourteen already selected projects were presented in a brief exposition, all of them highly collaborative projects involving Port Authorities, providing solutions to the needs of increasingly automated and robotic ports.

Later, in a first roundtable discussion, the bottlenecks for the effective introduction of innovation in the Port Community and the logistics chain were debated. The participants included Jorge Barrero, director of the COTEC foundation, as the moderator, and Guillermo Belcastro, CEO of Hutchinson Ports BEST, José Manuel Orengo, secretary of the board of Balearia, Enric Ticó, president of FETEIA-OLTRA, María Pilar Jurado, director of the Customs and Special Taxes Department, and Ignacio Ballester, deputy general manager of MSC Spain.

The ethical aspects associated with the implementation of new technologies are a matter of vital importance and could generate controversy in the future. In this regard, Francisco Lara, professor of Moral Philosophy at the University of Granada, gave a lecture on "Ethical Aspects of Artificial Intelligence."

Innovation and digitization are included as one of the 16 strategic lines of the recently approved new Strategic Framework. In a second roundtable, moderated by the Director of Planning and Development at Puertos del Estado, the presidents of the Port Authorities of Bahía de Algeciras, Bilbao, Valencia, and the president of Bahía de Cádiz intervened.

Strategies to promote entrepreneurship in Spain, initiatives, and regulatory proposals were addressed by Carlos Mateo, president of the Spanish Startups Association, Natán García from the public sector consulting firm KPMG, and Rafael Navarro from Insomnia.

The day concluded with the presentation of the conclusions by the president of Puertos del Estado, reiterating the importance of innovation for transportation, especially for ports, and encouraging the entire Port Community, especially the private sector, to continue engaging in new initiatives, which will always have the support of the port system.