UPRAVA POMORSKE SIGURNOSTI I UPRAVLJANJA LUKAMA

Their core work

Montenegro's national authority responsible for maritime safety, port management, and coastal surveillance operations based in the port city of Bar. In EU research projects, they serve as an operational end-user — testing and validating maritime surveillance systems, border security tools, and interoperability frameworks in real-world conditions along the Adriatic coast. Their participation brings the perspective of a small coastal state managing busy shipping lanes and complex border scenarios, providing testbed access and operational requirements that technology developers need. They also contribute to multimodal transport research, particularly on corridors connecting Europe to Asia.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

All five projects were launched within a tight 2019-2020 window, so there is no long evolution to trace — this organization entered H2020 late and concentrated its participation. The early projects (2019) focused squarely on maritime surveillance and border security information sharing. By 2020, they diversified slightly into first responder tools, AI-driven situational awareness, and multimodal transport logistics — suggesting a broadening from pure maritime security toward wider safety and connectivity themes.

Moving from traditional maritime monitoring toward AI-enhanced situational awareness and cross-domain security-transport applications, making them relevant for projects combining safety with smart logistics.

How they like to work

Exclusively a participant — they have never coordinated an H2020 project, which is typical for a national public authority contributing operational expertise rather than research leadership. Despite only five projects, they have worked with 113 unique partners across 24 countries, indicating they join large, multi-partner security and transport consortia. This makes them easy to onboard as an end-user partner who provides real-world validation without demanding consortium management responsibilities.

Remarkably broad network for a small national authority: 113 partners across 24 countries built through large security consortia. Their geographic reach spans well beyond the Western Balkans into core EU member states and beyond.

What sets them apart

As Montenegro's maritime safety authority, they offer something technology developers and system integrators rarely find easily: a non-EU coastal state operational environment for testing surveillance and border security systems. Montenegro's Adriatic coastline, busy port of Bar, and position on key shipping routes between EU and non-EU waters create a valuable edge-case testbed. For consortium builders, they check the "widening country" and "end-user authority" boxes simultaneously.

Highlights from their portfolio

• COMPASS2020
  Largest single grant (EUR 150,000) focused on persistent maritime surveillance — their core mission translated directly into EU research.
• ePIcenter
  A departure from their security focus into Physical Internet and global trade corridors (Silk Road, Arctic), showing strategic diversification into transport.