Wärtsilä turns to startups to help solve some of the biggest problems in the maritime industry
Wärtsilä’s Vesa Marttinen, Director Cruise and Ferry discusses the challenges in maritime industry together with partners in the first cycle of the program in May 2019 in Hamburg, the company said in its release.
The second cycle of the Trade & Transport Impact Program is launching their search for 10 mature startups to work together with Inmarsat, Cargotec, Shell, HHLA and Wärtsilä on solving some of the biggest problems in the maritime, trade and transport industry.
First of its kind, the Trade & Transport Impact Program is disrupting the maritime logistics industry together with its partners. It is designed to address real challenges within maritime trade and transportation by matching industry leaders with tech startups and scaleups in a collaborative outcome-oriented program.
The first cycle of the program, which ran in the spring of 2019, resulted in 11 pilot-projects between the 8 selected startups and the partner corporations. Now, the Trade & Transport Impact program is back and looking for 10 startups to join the second cycle.
In this second cycle of the program, Rainmaking expects more than 500 startups with relevant technology and business models to be identified.
Upon the application deadline on September 8th 2019, startups will be screened and the 10 teams will be invited for Selection Days in Hamburg and ultimately matched with the partners. Throughout the program, the corporate-startup engagement will be facilitated by Rainmaking in a 6-week long semi-remote program focused on building collaborative pilot-projects.
The shipping and supply chain industry has a need to digitize, however manual processes can be difficult to change on a large scale. Lack of automation, inefficiencies in terminal operations and insecure data leveraging are some of the issues that need to be handled, along with issues surrounding illegal access into ports and vessels.
Startups can help bring the future into the present for the partner companies, and enable transparency, enhance data leveraging and apply preventive measures to safeguard the port, the ship, and the crew. These issues are costing the industry millions, if not billions, of dollars, and ultimately taking a toll on the environment. The Trade & Transport Impact Program will match the best tech startups with global leaders in maritime and logistics for mutual results.
Wärtsilä in brief
Wärtsilä is a global leader in smart technologies and complete lifecycle solutions for the marine and energy markets. By emphasising sustainable innovation, total efficiency and data analytics, Wärtsilä maximises the environmental and economic performance of the vessels and power plants of its customers. In 2018, Wärtsilä's net sales totalled EUR 5.2 billion with approximately 19,000 employees. The company has operations in over 200 locations in more than 80 countries around the world. Wärtsilä is listed on Nasdaq Helsinki.
