The kick-off event of project STORM was held online in January 2021
The kick-off event of the EU H2020 funded project STORM (Smart freight TranspOrt and logistics Research Methodologies) was held online on 25th and 26th of January 2021, due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. However, the discussions were productive, and all partners were very enthusiastic about starting the project.
The STORM project will be carried out during a period of 30 months. The consortium is led by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland and partners from Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden), Fraunhofer Institute of Systems and Innovation Research (Germany), Czech Technical University in Prague (Czechia) and ERTICO – ITS (Belgium).
In the project, the consortium partners will strive to screen design concepts, methods and tools to meet the emerging needs for analysis, monitoring and assessment arising from latest disruptive technologies and trends in the freight and logistics sectors. The work will start by screening existing trends and challenges in order to identify analysis needs and knowledge gaps. In parallel to this, new sources of data enabled by the digitalization will be assessed. Later, new methods and tools for analysis of the structural changes, as well as for processing big data for the needs of freight and logistics will be elaborated. As a result of the project, recommendations for future business, research and policies will be formed, as well as a toolbox of open access materials.
During the project lifespan a project Advisory Board consisting of stakeholders from leading companies, research organizations and stakeholder NGOs will support the elaboration of the project findings and provide guidance on strategic issues, in order to maximize the project impact.
Eight members were already present at the kick-off event providing insights to their ongoing developments and cross-collaboration links to STORM project. Among them, were Zaragoza Logistics Center (Spain), Camideos (Germany), ABB eMobility Digital Venture (Netherlands), ATOS (Spain), Transport & Environment society (Belgium), Ford Otosan (Turkey), CLEPA – European Association of Automotive Suppliers (Belgium) and ITS-Finland. In addition, the dialogue with many other interested to join partners continues.
“I am happy to see that despite the difficult times in a middle of global pandemic, science, business and stakeholders with great excitement and hope for the future, join efforts to shape together the green future of such important sectors of a country’s economy as freight and logistics transport.” says Dr. Yancho Todorov, VTT, STORM project coordinator.