Although seaports have been very traditional in their ways of operating, nowadays there is an increasing trend of seaport competition and therefore the need for seaports to innovate. Innovation can either be technological or non-technological. This research will focus on the technological innovations within seaports, in recent years.

The purpose of the study is to find out how technological innovations can contribute to the development of the strategic positions of seaports.

The study was based on data retrieved from the literature. These findings were then combined with empirical data gathered with semi-structured interviews. A grounded theory method was implemented to conduct the interviews, which presents different perspectives to the same event. For this study, this means that the impact of innovation on the strategic position of seaports will be analyzed by looking at several similar cases, from different perspectives. To achieve this, this study looks at the points of view of different stakeholders in seaport innovation and strategic positioning. A grounded analysis was used to analyze the empirical data from the interviews.

The findings show that technological innovations with the highest impact on the strategic position of a seaport have been digital innovations. The people aspect is very important in making innovations successful. Project management, value sharing, and information sharing are key to implementing innovation successfully. Besides this, the people aspect is highly impacted by the overall strategy of the seaport. A strategy that is well-aligned with the technological innovation to be implemented, will result in more support and proactiveness towards bringing the innovation to a good result. Overall it can be said that successful implementation of an innovation, plus a wellaligned strategy are crucial for innovation to significantly contribute to a seaport’s strategic position.