Fundación Valenciaport and the CDTI organize a conference to promote maritime-port innovation

During the conference, the main calls and funding opportunities of CDTI and IVACE+i were presented to promote R&D&I projects, both at national and regional level
Companies such as TransBase Soler and Baleària shared their experiences and success stories in the development of projects supported by CDTI, IVACE+i initiatives and European programs such as Horizon Europe

Valencia, April 16th, 2025.– The Clock Building of the Port of Valencia has hosted this morning the ‘Jornada de Innovación Marítimo-Portuaria‘ session, an event organized by Fundación Valenciaport in collaboration with the Center for Technological Development and Innovation (CDTI), IVACE+i, the Logistop association, the Net-Zero Mar Alliance and LeaderTecna Ingenieros, with the support of the Port Authority of Valencia (APV) as host port.

The main objective of this conference, which brought together fifty professionals from the sector, was to present the grants, calls and programs available to promote R+D+i in the logistics-port cluster.

The institutional opening was in charge of Juan Manuel Díez, head of Innovation of the APV, who welcomed the attendees and highlighted the relevance of this type of programs to boost the competitiveness of the logistics-port community.

Next, representatives of CDTI and IVACE+i took the floor, who presented the main funding opportunities available for innovation projects, both at national and regional level.

Luis Maeso, technician of the Institutional Promotion and Territorial Cooperation department of the CDTI, was in charge of detailing the different lines of support available to promote innovative projects, highlighting the regional call ‘INNTERCONECTA STEP’, open until May 19 and aimed at funding R&D projects in cooperation led by companies working on disruptive technologies and proposing solutions to strategic challenges within the framework of Strategic Technologies for Europe (STEP).

In addition, he shared the different lines of support to finance innovation and expansion activities (LIC/LICA) and technology transfer R&D (Cervera), as well as individual and cooperative R&D projects.

For his part, Javier Mínguez, head of the area of companies and associations of IVACE+i, shared with the attendees the available programs aimed at companies in the Valencian Community. Among them, the programs to support process innovation, such as INNOVAPROC-CV, those to support product innovation, such as INNOVAPROD-CV, or those to support the digitalization of SMEs, such as DIGITALIZA-CV, stand out.

This was followed by a panel discussion in which several companies shared their experiences in the development of this type of projects, largely funded through programs promoted by CDTI, IVACE+i, or European programs such as Horizon Europe. Participants included Alfredo Soler, CEO of TransBase Soler; Jesús Blanco, Head of Decarbonization Projects at Baleària; Salvador Gallarte, Manager of LeaderTecna Ingenieros; Adrià Sancho, Global Key Account Manager at Methanol Reformer; and Eduardo Garro, R&D Coordinator at Prodevelop.

The day ended with a series of interviews between CDTI representatives and different companies interested in participating in one of its programs, in order to assess the feasibility of their ideas and guide them through the application process for the most relevant calls.