Innovation and digitalization in port enterprises

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to identify and analyze the main areas of research related to port companies, with a particular focus on sustainability, governance and digitalization impact. Today, port companies must increasingly outline their strategic activities in a sustainable way. Port activities directly involve local communities, which is another reason why the ability to operate in a 'sustainable' manner is becoming increasingly important. In fact the objective of social sustainability in a port system aims at the protection, support and valorization of all members of the port community itself and of the territorial community that lives in closer contact with the reality of the port and, more generally, at increasing the wellbeing of all those with whom the system relates. Considering that port activities involve many players and generate value over a very large territory, the policies implemented are numerous and varied, divided into four main areas: safety/security, relations with the territory, quality training, and seafarers' welfare. Technological innovation and the implementation of automation processes have also produced organisational changes in port companies, sometimes revolutionising the organisational structure. To achieve the goal, this paper aims to study how the literature has evolved in recent years in terms of environmental sustainability as it relates to port enterprises. Adopting structured literature review (SLR), this paper aims to answer the following questions: RQ1. How is research developing in the literature on the topic of port enterprises and their sustainable development? RQ2. What are the main foci of analysis in the extant literature? RQ3. What are the possible future research areas? Design/methodology/approach - In order to identify the topics covered and the survey methods used, a structured analysis of contributions in the literature (SLR) was conducted. The database used by the author to extract the information is SCOPUS, which is widely used and rich in multidisciplinary scientific literature. Specific keywords were identified to select relevant papers on the topic of sustainability and innovation in port enterprises. The search was developed in the following keywords "paper title," "abstract," and "keywords" to avoid including papers not related to the research objective. The search was limited to papers in the areas of "Business, Management and Accounting" and "Economics, Econometrics and Finance." Findings - The paper highlights how sustainability within port enterprises has been discussed in the literature, focusing on innovation in port governance models in line with sustainability. Research limitations/implications - One limitation of the paper is the use of only one database. Among the theoretical implications, this contribution suggests expanding studies on these issues, as well as suggesting possible areas for future research. Originality/value - This work stems from the need to provide an overview of the vast and varied literature on such a complex topic the development of port enterprises in a sustainable way.