Invited by the Opening Oceans Conference, a new initiative by NOR-Shipping to help realize the potential of the ocean space, I met Nir Gartzman, from theDOCK innovation hub, who was invited to participate in the Nordic ThinkTank session. Nir has an interesting background, he is a Chief Engineer and an Israeli navy officer who has spent the last 10 years in the high-tech & the clean-tech sector in Israel when his passion for the maritime industry made him focus on the digital arena and co-found an innovation hub. TheDock gathers innovators, investors and corporate partners on the same platform, which has been set up after having met with 20+ other innovation hubs for other sectors in Israel, they can now say that this is the best practice for how to do it.  Nir states that the coming 5 years will be very interesting for ships, operations, and ports. He can see the maritime sector follow the same paths as automotive & fin-tech has done and it's time to catch the opportunity to leverage the worldwide global connections that the maritime industry is so good at and make it into an advantage for a more transparent, accessible service to the customers. Listen to Nir and let us know your thoughts! Comment on www.shippingpodcast.com or in social media @shippingpodcast