Matthias Gronstedt

Matthias Gronstedt is the Managing Director of HHLA Sky since 2018. His task is: “Make Mobile Robots usable in a scalable and efficient way for industrial settings – open up the 3rd dimension, safely and securely, to existing business processes and add innovative new ones!”. He was entrusted with this task by the CEO of Hamburg Harbor Logistics AG (HHLA), Europe’s 3rd largest harbor enterprise, which is a pioneer in the extensive automation of container terminals, linked to a multi-modal distribution network connecting various regions of Europe. Drawing on his decades of expertise in industrial networking and automation, as well as his IT-background & international experience in technical and strategic sales and business development, he assembled a small team to develop together an entire system to allow active and intelligent control and monitoring of 100+ drones and autonomous mobile robots (AMR) and their tasks from integrated control centers. This result is a Mobile Robot Management Software for flying, driving, walking and swimming robots. The use of industrial protocols and mobile communication networks, Industry IoT cyber security standards, as well as adherence to international standards of machine safety – all have contributed in establishing a future-ready framework for the scalable operation of mobile robots. The system, consisting of both hard- and software elements, has gone public and has been operational since early 2020. Prior to HHLA Sky, Matthias held a position as Digital Strategy Consultant for HPC Hamburg Port Consulting. He studied at ESMT in Berlin, Germany and has an engineering degree in information technology/IT, as well as a diploma in technology management. He has spent most of his professional career working for Siemens.