The breakthrough application, developed over the past two years in collaboration with key shipowners, opens up a new horizon of possibilities for users – enabling real-time operational insight, performance optimisation and enhanced business decision making. NAVTOR CEO Tor Svanes says the product heralds “a future of efficiency, performance, intelligence and cost control” for owners of all sizes and segments.
NAVTOR has made its name through the development of a suite of innovative e-Navigation products, delivered, updated and connected through a cyber secure ecosystem that unites shoreside and vessel teams. This provides the platform for NavFleet, which seamlessly integrates real-time data from vessels, fleets, offices and an array of business-critical sources within a single, user-friendly, shoreside application.
The result is a complete, common situational awareness, with the ability to continually monitor and refine vessel performance. Or, as Svanes states, “complete control.”
Big picture benefits
He explains: “Our e-Navigation mission has always been to simplify operational tasks, while enhancing efficiency, safety and business performance. This may be a new arena for NAVTOR, but its built on those same principles and utilises our proven technology, infrastructure and expertise to deliver huge benefits for shipowners targeting improved ship management.
“Using our cyber-secure certified gateway, NavBox, and cloud computing resources we can enable remote teams to work as one – accessing data relating to, for example, vessel sensors, weather, passage planning, route optimisation, engines and fuel consumption, in real-time. In this way, users have a simplified interface where everything is connected, enabling them to see the ‘big picture’ rather than working to gather and analyse separate data streams in isolation. This unlocks smarter shipping for everyone… and the benefits of that are almost unlimited.”
Simply better
Performance optimisation is a key NavFleet selling point, with the ability to benchmark, troubleshoot, refine and share best practices across fleets, while solving individual vessel issues. For example, if a shoreside team knew what rpm should produce a speed of 10knots in good weather conditions, vessel engines could be set accordingly and ongoing speed monitored. If speed doesn’t meet expectations a hull performance issue could be identified, with bio-fouling producing frictional drag, hampering performance, and impacting on fuel consumption and efficiency. NavFleet would deliver this insight.
But, Svanes notes, that is really just the tip of the iceberg. The new awareness also enables easier compliance, alongside simplified reporting and administration, with the ability to automate key reports. Amongst these will be the mandated EU MRV/IMO DCS reports, which can be produced at the touch of a NavFleet button from later in 2021. A new approach to operational report handling will allow reports (e.g. noon reports) to be sent directly from vessels, but accessed from anywhere through the application.
In addition, NavFleet’s real-time monitoring capabilities will help office-based teams determine if vessels are falling short of KPIs or deviating from passage plans, facilitating swift remedial action. This ability makes it easier for owners to adhere to the covenants in charter party agreements, potentially avoiding performance claims and strengthening working relationships.
Future of smart shipping
“We’ve listened to our customers and the officers on the thousands of vessels we deliver services to and tailored a solution that helps them tackle some of their most pressing everyday challenges,” Svanes concludes. “It is powerful, flexible and will constantly evolve as we develop new functionality and refinements to meet the changing demands of this dynamic industry.
“We see this as a natural progression for NAVTOR and a further means of translating some of the principal benefits we’ve brought to e-Navigation into the context of overall fleet and business management. This is a new chapter for our company and, we believe, an essential application for enabling smarter, more sustainable and profitable shipping organisations.”
NAVTOR opened its doors in Egersund, Norway in 2011, and has since grown into the world’s leading supplier of innovative e-Navigation solutions. It now operates a global network of eight full-time offices and has more than 20 international distributors. The company currently boasts customers in over 60 countries, from all shipping segments, with products and services onboard around 7000 individual vessels.