Maritime AI Centre National Workshop #2 – Ålesund
130 participants on day one and 90 on day two made the second national workshop of the Norwegian Maritime AI Centre (MAI) in Ålesund a full house. Over two days, 27–28 October, shipowners, yards, equipment suppliers, researchers and clusters met to turn AI interest into concrete activities and spin-out projects in the Centre.
GCE Blue Maritime Cluster co-organized the workshop with NTNU and presented the cluster's role as the bridge between research and industry, aiming to both connect the industry to make research more relevant and to
The workshop ran from lunch to lunch. Day one was held in Auditorium Møretanken at the Norwegian Maritime Competence Center and was open to all partner tiers, with presentations also streamed online. Day two moved to Thon Hotel Ålesund for Tier 1 and Tier 2 partners, as well as the cluster and interest organizations.
Day one: from status to practice
Newcomers to the Centre began the first day with a brief introduction before lunch, so everyone could join the program on the same footing. MAI Director Tor Arne Johansen of NTNU then kicked off with a status update on the Centre's people and activities.
The first part featured inspiring talks from several of the Center’s partners.
Leif Gunnar Alvær, Chief Digital Officer at Utkilen, explained how they are using AI agents to perform real work onboard and to develop each other. Andre Ellefsen, CEO at DIPAI, showcased how their AI-powered platform can help shipowners reduce fuel consumption and simplify predictive maintenance, while Konstantinos Christakos, NorDITO Lead at the Norwegian Meteorological Institute, described how AI is significantly reducing the costs of large data models for climate prediction.
Bjørn-Johan Vartdal, Digital Director at DNV, followed with a talk on making large language models more reliable in the maritime domain.
After the break, the focus shifted to how companies can turn their AI interests into Center activities. After an introduction from Marte Giskeødegård and Marie Haugli-Sandvik from NTNU, Øystein Longva, CTO of Vard Electro, explained how, with the help of master's students, they can start developing real challenges they don’t have time for on their own. Lars Erik Klementsen of Neuver Maritime shared how they work with AI and with their industrial PhD, Zelda Molnes.
The day ended with a workshop and plenary discussion on, and the conversations carried on over dinner at Thon Hotel Ålesund.
The clusters as the bridge
In the last session of day one, Knut Tore Aurdal, Head of Projects and Innovation at GCE Blue Maritime Cluster, and Anna With Rødstøl, Senior Advisor at ÅKP and the NEMONOOR project, presented the ecosystem around the Center and how Blue Maritime Cluster and ÅKP work to make a complete ecosystem that can support the maritime companies in adopting AI and ultimately using it to strengthen their competitiveness.
On one side, the maritime cluster must stay at the very front of AI research and development to maintain its global position. On the other hand, the companies need agile ways to build knowledge and to act fast in their own operations. Together, the test arenas and clusters in MAI offer a large network of schemes and support functions that companies and researchers can explore and use along the way.
For GCE Blue Maritime and ÅKP, the Maritime AI Center and the EU-funded EDIH Project Nemonoor provide the framework for merging these capabilities.
Inspiration – Information and Innovation
Inspiration. Most companies meet AI first in the cluster. GCE Blue Maritime Cluster mobilizes its members through conferences, workshops, and networks, and members automatically join the Center as Tier 3 partners.
Information. Through NEMONOOR, where GCE Blue Maritime is a partner through the Norwegian Digital Catapult, companies get access to subsidized AI courses and a wider network of AI expertise.
Innovation. Norwegian Digital Catapult helps the companies move from knowing to doing. Through NEMONOOR, companies get testing, funding and access to the very popular services "Sprint to AI" and "CTO for Hire". The goal is a pilot in the company's own operations, and the experience could again feed back into the Center's research as new use cases.
The Center looks for what AI will make possible in five years, while NEMONOOR looks for what we can do with AI today. The maritime cluster and the companies need both, and the cluster's job is to connect them. Hopefully we’ll see many cases in the time to come where parts of what is discovered in the NEMONOOR AI Center will get a fast-track commercialization through NT
Day two: data, competence and the road ahead
Day two brought together 90 Tier 1 and Tier 2 partners, plus cluster and interest organizations, at Thon Hotel Ålesund. Heini Ikävalko of Aalto University School of Business opened with lessons on data sharing across value chains from other industries. Eirik Sivertsen, NTNU and MAI Co-Director, and PhD candidate Kjetil Vasstein then covered data management in MAI, digital research infrastructure, dissemination and security.
Competence was the next theme. Ole Andreas Alsos, NTNU and MAI Co-Director, and Knut Tore Aurdal discussed how to map and meet the new competence needs that AI creates before parallel workshops about the center’s focus areas use cases and wrapped up this autumns workshop. Concluding two intense days of the AI development status.
