LEAD will create Digital Twins of urban logistics networks in six cities, to support experimentation and decision making with on-demand logistics operations in a public-private urban setting. Innovative solutions for city logistics will be represented by a set of value case scenarios, that address the requirements of the on-demand economy while aligning competing interests and creating value for all different stakeholders. Each value case will combine a number of measures (LEAD Strategies): a) innovative business models, b) agile urban freight storage and last-mile distribution schemes, c) low emission, automated, electric or hybrid delivery vehicles, and d) smart logistics solutions. Scenarios will incorporate opportunities for shared, connected and low-emission logistics operations by considering four innovation drivers: Sustainability - Zero Emission Logistics, the Sharing Economy, Technology Advancements and the emerging Physical Internet (PI) paradigm. Cost, environmental and operational efficiencies for value cases will be measured in 6 Living Labs (Madrid, The Hague, Budapest, Lyon, Oslo, Porto). Evidence-proven value cases and associated logistics solutions will be delivered in the form of exploitable Digital Twins (TRL-7), incorporating the models that support adaptation to different contexts and that provide incentives for PPPs. The long-term vision of LEAD is to design an Open PI-inspired framework for Smart City Logistics that incorporates the Digital Twins created in the project, thus setting the foundations for the development of large-scale city Digital Twins. The LEAD consortium comprises 22 partners, all of whom are involved in the Living Labs, supported by 5 international partners for knowledge transfer. This incentivises the co-creation of solutions by city authorities, logistics industry leaders, start-ups and research experts in freight modelling, complex simulation and logistics optimisation.

Argusi is a research driven SME that possesses deep knowledge about supply chain optimization and collaboration in mainly the commercial sector. Argusi’s expertise focuses on designing optimal supply networks in terms of minimized cost or time-to-consumer by using state of the art modelling tools and techniques. With the branch Argusi Aid, Argusi aims to explore a new market opportunity by transferring knowledge and technical models from the commercial sector to the humanitarian sector, while at the same time making a contribution to a better world. To be able to develop Argusi Aid to its full potential, knowledge of and experience from both commercial sector and humanitarian sector supply chains is needed. Besides Argusi’s strong knowledge of supply chain design, optimization and collaboration, specific knowledge is required on the highly uncertain and variable demand, the challenging distribution networks, the influence of donors as an additional supply chain party, and the difference between emergency response and development supply chains. Cultural and regional knowledge is needed for knowing the right way of transferring knowledge and technical models taking into account country and sector specific factors. This knowledge needs to be combined to research and develop an overview of differences and similarities between commercial, emergency response and development supply chains, a visual insight in global supply chain flows and current (in)efficiencies finding synergies between NGO supply chains and technical supply chain models for the different humanitarian supply chains (emergency response and development supply chains) taking into account the uncertainties and additional actor. An internal and external training package and a long term business plan also have to be developed. Knowledge training in Argusi’s topics of expertise and software and skills training in e.g. project management, leadership skills and developing business plans will be provided.

“If we want to reach the EU objective on modal shift for all transportation beyond 300 km and attract and strengthen competitiveness of local industries at the same time, we need to drive the development of a network of hyper connected logistics multimodal clusters and their influence areas”. Clusters 2.0 Consortium Clusters 2.0. vision is to leverage the full potential of European Logistics Clusters for an efficient and fully integrated transport system in Europe making optimal use of an Open Network of Logistics Clusters and hubs starting with. Zaragoza (PLAZA), Duisburg (Duisport), Lille (Dourges), Bologna-Trieste (Interporto/port of Trieste), Brussels (BruCargo), London (Heathrow), Pireaus (PCT), Trelleborg (Port), while keeping neutral the environmental and local impacts such as congestion, noise, land use and local pollution levels. Cluster 2.0 objectives and areas of intervention are: Increase the engagement, performance and coordination of terminals and hubs at cluster level targeting: i) increase by 50% the freight managed in the cluster whit current infrastructure, ii) Double the value added activities and iii) increase economic impact in local economies by 5% yearly while keeping neutral local environmental impacts. Build a hyper connected network of logistics hubs and clusters targeting: i) increase average door-to-door vehicle load factor up to 75%, ii) increase intermodal transport in the network by 40%. Develop low cost, low capital and investment intensive transhipment enhanced solutions to reduce operational costs of transhipment by 30 %. Develop prototypes of New Modular Load Units as enhancers of the above objectives.Develop terminal management systems to increase management capacity of the terminals by 20% and reduce associated congestion by 10%. Establish and run 5 Living Labs (LLs) to test, improve an validate proposed solutions as well as to and Develop Business Models and Robust Business Plans for Clusters 2.0 solutions.