AIRSHIP Consortium meets in Porto to advance Technical Work and co-develop the future Roadmap

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From the 25thuntil the 27thof November 2025, the AIRSHIP partners met in Porto (Portugal) for their 6th Consortium Meeting. Hosted by Portuguese partner INESC TEC, the meeting was held in the premises of the ISEP Hub (Porto School of Engineering). Over three days, partners reviewed progress across all Work Packages, exchanged on technical developments, and collaborated on the next steps of the AIRSHIP innovation pathway by actively engaging in a roadmapping workshop. The Steering Committee meeting was also held during the event in preparation for the next project review period.

The programme included updates across Work Packages, dealing with project coordination and management, sustainability and social impact assessments, WIG design, power and control avionics, perception and mission systems, and ongoing and planned field-testing and WIG integration. These exchanges provided an important checkpoint as AIRSHIP moves into its final year of development.

Roadmapping and Innovation Agenda 

A key milestone of the 6th Consortium meeting was the WP9 2nd Roadmapping Workshop, which focused on backcasting methodology from foresight studies to further work on the pillars identified by partners in the 1st Roadmapping Workshop held in the previous CM (May 2025, Tampere, Finland). This second workshop, led by AIRSHIP partner La Palma Research Centre (LPRC), built directly on the outcomes of the online experts’ discussion hosted on the 29th of October, where external specialists worked with the guideline-cards’ approach to identify targets, bottlenecks, and pathways to address three central pillars in innovative technological research and development projects: Reliability, Regulations, and Funding. 

The outcomes from this external experts’ session were brought to Porto so that Consortium partners could:

  • connect expert-level insights from different EU-funded projects and professional experiences with the specific characteristics, challenges, and future goals of AIRSHIP technology,
  • refine or adapt the pre-filled guideline cards to reflect the project’s technical and operational direction, or
  • generate new, AIRSHIP-tailored guideline cards that respond to the project’s application environment and concrete needs. 

Similarly to the 1st Roadmapping workshop, partners were distributed into four groups ensuring diversity of technical expertise and partners’ representation. The discussion was structured as follows: the small groups worked on guideline cards addressing one of the three pillars at a time for around 20 minutes, the outcomes of which were presented in a plenary discussion; then, groups worked on the other two pillars based on the same method. 

Overall, the three pillars were centered around the following issues: 

  • Reliability cards explored how AIRSHIP can build trustworthy operations, from leveraging proven off-the-shelf commercial components to phased validation in simulation and sea trials.
  • Regulatory cards examined pathways for testing and operating an autonomous WIG vehicle, bridging maritime and aviation frameworks at international (IMO), EU, and national/regional levels, and highlighting early engagement with public authorities and regional stakeholders. They highlighted the gaps in current legislation across Europe and the need for updating an homogenised framework for testing, validation, and future commercialization of WIG technology.
  • Funding cards assessed the viability of future funding routes, including EU Innovation Actions, national funding schemes, climate-tech private investment, dual-use opportunities, and private-sector partnerships.