By
Elizabeth Robinson |
Marine technology firm Wärtsilä has outlined its vision for a ‘smart marine ecosystem’ to deliver greater efficiency and increase revenues and profitability for ship owners and operators.
“The world is moving towards a future that is more and more connected, and nowhere is this more apparent than in the shipping sector,” said Roger Holm, president of Wärtsilä Marine Solutions. “The opportunities offered through smart technology will foster a new era of collaboration and knowledge sharing with customers, suppliers and partners.”
The firm says that marine industry players are faced with major sources of inefficiency that impact operations and profitability, including overcapacity, inadequate port-to-port fuel efficiency, and time wasted waiting when entering ports. Eliminating this waste forms the basis of the new vision.
Wärtsilä outlines “four primary forces that will reshape the industry”. Shared capacity will improve fill rates and reduce unit costs, big data analytics will optimise operations and energy management, intelligent vessels will enable automated and optimised processes, and smart ports will result in smoother and faster port operations.
“Wärtsilä is ideally positioned, together with our customers and partners, for positive disruptive development and to lead the transformation into a new era of shipping,” said Holm. “Building on our strong existing portfolio of products, systems, and solutions, the broadest in the marine sector, and on our vast installed base and industry know-how, we shall continue to develop the smart technologies, business models, and competences needed to create a Smart Marine Ecosystem."
“Servicing our customers means supporting them throughout the lifecycle of their installations,” said Pierpaolo Barbone, president of Wärtsilä Services. “This means that we are looking at the smartest way of operating and maintaining assets, as well as optimising performance in order to have the safest, and most environmentally sound and efficient operating profiles. In the future, we shall be looking more holistically at customer business operations. Instead of optimising a single vessel, we may be optimising a fleet, or even the customer’s business. In the long term, vessel-as-a-service becomes the ultimate means of providing asset and lifecycle management services.”
Steps already taken by Wärtsilä to apply smart technology include a successful test of the remote control of a ship’s operations by satellite from a distance of 8,000 kilometres, the Wärtsilä HY fully integrated hybrid power module, wireless charging for battery-operated vessels and the opening of a Digital Acceleration Centre in Helsinki to speed up innovation. More centres will open in Singapore, Central Europe and North America in the coming months.