The International Association of Ports and Harbors (IAPH) has added maritime accelerator PortXL as partner onto its World Ports Sustainability Program. An agreement was signed last week to develop a worldwide innovation platform, where ports can engage in pilots and partnerships with start-ups and scale-ups.
This comes as part of a short-term plan to bring IAPH members into contact with the network of innovators.
The port industry is of major significance for an economy, nationally and internationally. But at the same time, port industry activities impact the environment. So if we want to sustain the growth of the economy, we should look after our ecology. And innovation is actually the answer for both,
…comments PortXL Co-Founder and Director Carolien Vat-Sandee.
PortXL seeks to address ports’ need worldwide to “grow the economy, whilst sustaining the ecology”.
Supported by partners as Van Oord, Shell, MSC, DEME, Boskalis and Vopak, PortXL scouts over 1,000 start-ups and scale-ups and selects up to twenty for each of its locations every year.
Those selected then gain access to mentorship, training and are given the chance to pitch to organizations to implement paid-for pilots and proof-of-concepts to demonstrate their innovations in a live environment.
The plan is to create viable matches by allowing port authorities to connect their own major stakeholders and companies operating at their port with the PortXL-endorsed innovators. Port Authorities know which of their customers and stakeholders might be best equipped to trial and use these innovations. This has already yielded results at the Port of Rotterdam, North Sea Port and the Port of Antwerp, but really a coastal location of any size, anywhere in the world could benefit. As an example, it is in Gibraltar where the world’s first wave-generated electricity is being fed into the grid,
…comments PortXL Director Cees-Willem Koorneef.
Earlier this month, PortXL received the Initiative Award at the 2019 CAREER4SEA – EUROPORT Awards for its annual innovation program, which focuses on creating tangible business value for maritime startups who are serious about building their business.
