TRIESTE – Adriafer Group has joined the Waterborne Technology Platform, the European body that aligns industry and EU institutions on technology strategies for the maritime sector.
The platform was created to maintain a stable dialogue between Europe’s waterborne sector, EU institutions and Member States. It brings together shipowners, shipyards, equipment manufacturers, classification societies, energy operators, service providers, ports, universities and research centres. It also coordinates the private side of the “Zero-Emission Waterborne Transport” partnership.
Adriafer’s entry—operating as a shunting operator and positioning itself as part of the port ecosystem, with an operational focus on integration between the maritime and rail domains—strengthens representation of port actors, particularly on the interface between port and hinterland.
The platform is working on a technology roadmap for port ecosystems covering research, development, innovation, upscaling and deployment. The aim is to support the transformation of European ports into next-generation hubs for energy, logistics, digital services and industrial activities, capable of handling zero-emission vessels, smart logistics chains and resilient coastal infrastructure.
According to Adriafer, the added value will be to bring concrete use cases on smart rail shunting, digital decision-support systems, predictive maintenance and secure exchange of multimodal data. The stated goal is to contribute to roadmaps that can be applied in real logistics settings.
For Secretary General Jaap Gebraad, Adriafer’s contribution will be relevant to ensure the strategy includes the perspective of the whole ecosystem—especially the port–hinterland link—so that the solutions developed are actually deployable.
The platform has members in around 19 EU Member States and in four European countries associated with Horizon Europe.
