On 28 April 2011, in Opatija, Croatia, B2B LOCO project held two meetings entitled "Transport and logistics SMEs: Coordination and competition", organized by Prometis Ltd. More than 60 participants attended meetings, partly combined with the Croatian Scientific Society for Transport Symposium “Transport Systems 2011”. The 2nd B2B LOCO Workshop was held in the morning and the 3rd Brokerage Event at the afternoon, finishing with common dinner suitable for partners face to face business talks. During both meetings interesting presentations were shown and followed by discussions and brainstorming.
Dr. Algirdas Šakalys (Vilnius Gediminas Technical University, Lithuania) in his presentation "Lithuanian intermodal transport technology platform as an innovative instrument for cluster cooperation" accentuated transport system as a vital booster of Lithuanian economy, producing 13% of GDP (2,25 billion Euros in 2010). Lithuanian answer to the globalization challenges on behalf of SMEs has been closer cooperation between various types of transport structures, as well as between SMEs and other transport players.
Lithuania has developed a structure of a new type of co-operation in transport creating a platform (Lithuanian Intermodal Transport Technology Platform - LITTP, 2007) where representatives of various transport sectors could more actively and effectively improve the national transport system.
“Using RFID for paper reel tracking”, the presentation of Yale T. Herer, A. Avrahami and A. Shtub (Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, Israel) on the example of one Israeli printing house documents why modern logistics is increasingly reliant on different RFID technologies. As a key cost element in the print industry is paper (20%-30% of total printing expenditures), any improvement in the operational efficiency of paper reel management has the potential of yielding considerable cost savings. In the analysed printing house case several SMEs have joined forces to produce a system for the internal management of the paper reel supply chain based on use of the semi active RFID technology.
In the presentation of Velizara Pencheva and Svetlin Stoyanov (University of Rousse, Bulgaria) - Challenges to the transport and logistics SMEs during the EU accession - it is pointed out that some 23 million of EU SMEs represent 99% of all EU enterprises, employing approximately 100 million people, thus being key source of jobs and business ideas. Because of that EU policy forces creation of a favorable environment for SMEs, particularly by reducing administrative burden.
Among nine presentations within the Brokerage Event, two were of special importance: “B2B LOCO Brokerage tool” (Mr. Balazs Barta, PBN, Hungary) and “B2B LOCO project data base with selected success stories” (presentation of Mr. Michael Gogas, presented by Mr. Manos Anastasios AUTh, Greece), presenting the audience with the core B2B LOCO project pillars allowing the transfer of knowledge to the SMEs and gathering SMEs in Brokerage network. Other presentations were also very competent, dealing with different themes, namely eco-driving, research for the benefit of SMEs, Europe Enterprise Network and, particularly, so important horizontal cooperation.
From the aspect of achieving project objectives and benefits for participants, both meetings can be considered as very useful and bringing opportunities for future business and projects’ cooperation. All presentations and their summaries are available on http://b2bloco.eu/events/opatija/index.html.
Franjo Mihoci
Prometis, Ltd.