Travelogue: Study Trip to Hamburg in November 2017

The students from the GSCLM Program assembled in the lobby at KLU after five exciting days in Hamburg
Photo: Thomas Roslyng Olesen
 

Travelogue: Study trip to Hamburg with the Global Supply Chain and Logistics Management Program in November 2017
24.11.2017 by Assistant Professor Thomas Roslyng Olesen

In November a group of 39 students from the Global Supply Chain and Logistics Management (GSCLM) Program visited Hamburg on a five day study trip. The program is the result of a collaboration between Copenhagen Business School, The Chinese University of Hong Kong-Shenzhen and The University of British Columbia, which brings top students from three continents together in an ambitious and multicultural environment. The students were accompanied by Professor Britta Gammelgaard and Assistant Professor Thomas Roslyng Olesen. The study trip, that is part of this course, was kindly financially supported by Hedorfs Fond and CBS Maritime.
Following the arrival in Hamburg on the first day, we were welcomed by Kühne Logistics University (KLU) who hosted us during the visit. The university is located in Hamburg’s Hafen City in a privileged location with a panoramic view to the port. The welcoming session was followed by a guided boat trip around the port of Hamburg that allowed us to see the vessels, terminals and additional infrastructure in the port. After the boat trip we were accompanied to the Restaurant Alte Liebe where we had an excellent welcome dinner.
On the second day, we met at KLU for an interesting morning lecture on Port Operations and Management by Professor Dr. Michele Acciaro. The lecture was followed by an excursion to the HHLA Container terminal in Altenwerder, where Dr. Nils Kemme from Hamburg Port Consulting told us about the terminal. After the presentation, Dr. Kemme took us on a guided tour around the terminal, where we had a closer look at the facilities.
We spent the third day at KLU playing an enjoyable business game on maritime logistics. The game was hosted by researchers from Fraunhofer Center for Maritime Logistics and Services at the Technical University of Hamburg and provided an efficient learning tool to understand the complexity of liner shipping logistics and port operations. It fostered the participants’ creativity and cooperation, as the different teams should develop solutions for optimizing the flow of information and cargo traveling through the “port”.
On day four, a bus took us to the Airbus factory in Finkenwerder where we had an interesting tour on the site. Airbus has manufacturing sites several places in Europe and we heard a lot about the logistics operations of the company. In the afternoon we visited two other Hamburg based companied – NKG Kala and Ratsherrn – and heard about the history and activities of the two companies.
Our final day in Hamburg began at KLU where Professor Dr. Hanno Friedrich gave an interesting lecture on innovation and start-ups in logistics and transportation. The lecture was followed by a round table session on digitalization in transportation. Mr Niklas Ohling from Hapag-Lloyd, Ms. Silvia Maieria from K+N Airfreight and Mr Rolf-Dieter Lawrenz from CargoNexx gave their views on how digitalization impacts transportation now and in the future. After a short wrap up we headed for the bus and returned to Copenhagen. With its many company visits, stakeholder presentations, and lectures at KLU the trip has been a valuable addition to the topics the students have covered in the lectures at CBS.

Day 1: The boat trip in the port of Hamburg. Photo: Thomas Roslyng Olesen

Day 2: Lecture with Professor Dr. Michele Acciaro. Photo: Thomas Roslyng Olesen