Literature Review on the Smart Port: Evolution, Technological Development, Performance Indicators of Smart Ports

Boost in the global supply chain in the post-industry 4.0 revolution has amplified the demand for maritime ports, triggering their operational capacities, competitiveness, and sustainability concerns. Maritime ports are undergoing a paradigm shift, an evolution from goods loading and unloading terminals to highly intelligent hubs in the logistic supply chain. Existing literature on smart ports focuses on different aspects such as evolution stages, bibliometrics analysis, feasible technologies, and Key Performance Indicators (KPI). This review complements the existing ones by investigating the term “smart port” definition, the technology use, the Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), and providing bibliometric analysis across major databases, sourcing from journals, conferences, official websites, and books in various disciplines. Results show that the definition of “smart port” is still under development. Moreover, the major driver of transformation is the technology use, some technologies are mature enough for implementation and the rest are in the early stages. Importantly, along with innovative technologies, management skills play a crucial role in successful implementation. The Smartness of the port is difficult to answer but an accurate quantification of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) can assist the ports in gauging their level of “smartness”. From the bibliometric perspective, there is a growing trend of smart port research, particularly in recent years. This trend is interestingly almost uniformly distributed in different geographic locations. The findings underscore the kernel role of technology in shaping smart port evolution, and performance indicators for quantifying the smartness. The investigation of the challenges for ports to implement technologies is a key area for future research.