A centre of excellence in maritime robotics will help salvage part of Croatia’s once-great Brodarski Institute
An artist’s impression of the Brodarski Institute after renovation by the Marble project, with the reconditioned experimental pool on the left and a new roof-top drone arena on the right. Photo credits: Marble
A €30 million project partly funded by the EU is set to rescue key parts of a massive communist-era maritime research centre in Croatia. Turned into a state-owned, for-profit company after independence, the Brodarski Institute is being liquidated by the government after years of losses.
The maritime R&D institute was once the pride of Yugoslavia. Built in the 1950s on a sprawling site in the modernist Novi Zagreb district, its offices and laboratories spread over 13.6 hectares, with giant pools and tunnels for testing ships and submarines.
At its peak, hundreds of engineering and support staff worked at the institute, developing submarines and warships for Yugoslavia’s navy. During the war for independence in the 1990s, it helped equip Croatia’s army.
But after independence, with a new commercial mission, the Brodarski Institute struggled to become…
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