• The conference, led by Fundación Valenciaport, was attended by representatives of the Port Authority of Valencia, Cosco Shipping, MSC and VTE, among others
• During the meeting, the lines and working groups that will propose solutions to the problems detected by the entities of the cluster were presented

Valencia, 17th January 2024. – The first Valenciaport Cluster’s Innovation Committee meeting of 2024 was held yesterday afternoon. The reunion, led by Fundación Valenciaport, was attended and participated by representatives of the Port Authority of Valencia, Cosco, MSC, APM Terminals, CSP Spain, VTE, MSCTV, TransBase Soler, Raminatrans, Chema Ballester and TIBA, among others.

During the inauguration, Antonio Torregrosa, general director of Fundación Valenciaport, presented Francesc Sánchez as the new president of Fundación Valenciaport, and Enrique Belda as the new director of the APV, who addressed the attendees on the importance of innovation for the competitiveness of the sector and explained his experience in this field.

On the other hand, Salvador Furió, deputy director of Fundación Valenciaport, presented the agenda of the meeting and made a brief review of the most recent activity of the Committee and the various projects born as a result of the challenges identified by the participating entities, highlighting the VIGIA project; an initiative focused on the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in surveillance systems to solve the problems associated with access control in logistics facilities, and whose project results were very interesting for the attendees, who raised the need to implement them in the Port of Valencia.

The project, funded by the Valencian Innovation Agency (AVI), has involved the participation of companies and organisations such as Infoport, Tyris AI, the Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV), ITI, and Fundación Valenciaport.

As Ángel Laguna, Innovation technician at Fundación Valenciaport, explained, the project has demonstrated the streamlining of access to logistics facilities through the development of a single platform for the management and exchange of documentation and an access control module with facial recognition algorithms and licence plate reading systems, among others.

After the presentation of the project, the representatives of the new working groups, aligned with the Cluster’s Innovation Plan, presented at the end of 2022, were introduced: the Artificial Intelligence group, the Maritime Operations group, and the Security group.

Working Groups

The working group, Artificial Intelligence and Value Added Services, aims to contribute to the development of an advanced and competitive industry around ports, exploiting technologies such as AI or Machine Learning.

As Ángel Laguna, Innovation technician at Fundación Valenciaport, explained, the project has demonstrated the streamlining of access to logistics facilities through the development of a single platform for the management and exchange of documentation and an access control module with facial recognition algorithms and licence plate reading systems, among others.

After the jroject presentation, the representatives of the new working groups, aligned with the Cluster’s Innovation Plan, presented at the end of 2022, were introduced: the Artificial Intelligence group, the Maritime Operations group, and the Security group.

Working Groups

The working group, Artificial Intelligence and Value Added Services, aims to contribute to the development of an advanced and competitive industry around ports, exploiting technologies such as AI or Machine Learning.

Miguel Llop, Director of Digital Transformation at Fundación Valenciaport, shared the projects in which his organisation is already participating in this field, such as the THEMIS project, on the reliability of AI-based systems, and FOR-FREIGHT, on transport optimisation. In addition, he listed the steps to be followed, including the organisation of a kick-off meeting to identify the opportunities and needs of the team, as well as the methodology and the definition of the work plan.

For his part, José Andrés Giménez, Director of Port Logistics at Fundación Valenciaport, presented the action plan of the Maritime Operations working group, whose strategy is linked to the deployment of the PAULA digital platform in the ports of Valencia and Sagunto; a system created by the startup SEAPort Solutions, which facilitates the real-time exchange of data associated with maritime scale events, improving the visibility and capacity for planning and execution of processes.

He also presented some of the projects in this field on which Fundación Valenciaport is working, such as the MISSION or TIC4.0 initiatives, on the development of solutions for optimising maritime port chains.

Finally, Rafael Company, Director of Security at Fundación Valenciaport, introduced the lines of work of the Security group: Technologies applied to security and safety models, Unmanned aerial and underwater vehicles and Cybersecurity.

Following the previous outline, Company also presented the initiatives related to this subject in which Fundación Valenciaport is already involved, including the Sauron, SMAUG, PASSPORT, CYBERSANE and Cyber MAR projects, among others.

In the upcoming months, the different working groups will meet to make progress in identifying the needs of the sector in terms of security, Artificial Intelligence and Maritime Operations, promoting innovation and competitiveness of the Valencian port logistics