Mission Control - Stage 3 Systems

We’ve had a team in Bergen this week - Dewi from the UK and Alex from Vancouver working with Grieg Star on releasing a new module in our Charter Watch application specifically for Greig. This will help their ‘Booking Agents’ manage the request for freight process from initial capture of the possible cargo, to indication, offer, negotiation and booking. Not only does it create a common workspace for Grieg’s own team, but it draws in their commercial partners (shipbrokers and representatives) into a close collaborative workflow. It’s built on our ongoing work with other Charter Watch customers (such as Spliethoff) and will see the system extended to manage a wider range of breakbulk cargoes as well. There will also be integration with the Dataloy Voyage Management System creating an end to end process for the chartering team.

We’ve launched a brand new website for our SEDNA email system. Check out more about how we’re helping world class companies revolutionize their shared email at sedna.email

This Map Perfectly Illustrates The Importance of Shipping In Today's World – gCaptain

We’re completing a powerful search tool update to our Aquila Project Quality Management System. This is the Documentation module that lets shipowners digitize all relevant documents and files associated with their vessels. It moves this information into the cloud not as unstructured files but instead specifically tagged and versioned to each individual vessel and project. Instant recall of hundreds of thousands of documents from the oldest to latest versions is possible with this module.

Our client Grieg Star (who uses our Charter Watch product to manage project cargo bookings) has this great drone footage of wind turbines being loaded from Spain. Very cool to see the cargo operation from this perspective.

To blur or not to blur. We even debate the photos used on our various log in pages. This picture is from a trip to the giant DSME shipyard in South Korea a few years ago as part of an LNG charter performance measurement project we were working on. This photo will go on our Aquila log in page - as owners around the world in small and large shipyards build new vessels they will see this page. We help them manage the massive volume of communications, supporting documentation and issues at the heart of any complex industrial construction project. We help them to sweat the details. We help them build better vessels.

Visiting some clients in Rotterdam today.

Seamar Shipping Services & Logistics, Italy has commenced use of our Agency Operations System and will shortly begin using our shared email tool built for shipping - SEDNA. ​Fabio Desideri having first seen the product back in 2013 kept us in mind until the opportunity arose to deploy AOS at Seamar. They will use the system to bring all their Sub Agency appointments under one operating system and manage all their vessels as a team with the benefits that SEDNA bring.

It looks to be another great conference as over 1,500 participants attend this year. We look forward to discussing our story about how we help companies and people in our industry build better ships (with Aquila), help them manage their vessels performance (through our Fleet Performance System), help owners manage their cargoes from order through to fixture (with Charter Watch), help them manage their port calls (through the Agency Operations System), and with a messaging platform specifically designed for shared email addresses, large volumes and shipping we help our clients manage these and all their counter party discussions (with the SEDNA Network). 

This latest update enables shipowners to create a yard inspection that needs to occur across all vessels within a project as well as inspections specific to a single or small group of vessels. Inspections can be scheduled in advance if there is a known date or recorded retroactively. If a follow on inspection is required, Aquila allows owners to maintain sets of uploaded documents ordered by date so there is no need to re-create the inspection again. Inspections can be ‘passed’ by the assignee to the inspector but only a site-manager can actually ‘accept’ the inspection to ensure that all of the necessary documents and certificates have been collected prior to closing out the inspection.

We’re in the final stages of testing our new Fleet Performance System OnBoard client with our clients. It’s a major evolution of our product which permits both online and offline capture of all the operational and engineering data from the Captain and his team on board the vessel through to our engine and vessel performance platform. It includes major gains in usability, speed and configuration with powerful capabilities for our customers to design reports quickly, deploy instantly, validate onboard and be available for shore side analysis in real time; all the while giving the team on the vessel access to the same information. We’ll be updating more in the next few weeks.

Visiting San Francisco this week. Looking forward to some great meetings and discussion.

We dropped by a client in London this week ...and was reviewing some new features for our SEDNA Network messaging service. While seeing how they worked on a users computer we noticed the message count in the upper window. It wasn’t lost on them (or us) just how powerful it is to be able to search 7 million plus messages (plus the files attached to them) immediately. Instant recall can make the burden of email in the shipping industry an asset.

We just wrapped up training for the deployment of SEDNA to South32 in Singapore. Initial use is with the Chartering and Operations teams. It’s a major shift in how they archive and manage messages away from Outlook and collaborate across teams. We look forward to driving the product forward with them as we continue to add powerful new features. 

Just before the Christmas break we released an update to our SEDNA Network product. Clients can have their trading and operations systems advise which vessels and voyages a user is responsible for. Once SEDNA has this information each email is read and analyzed as it is received. If the vessel name and/or voyage appears (including incorrectly spelled variations) SEDNA can suggest the head fixture as well as the current, previous and next voyage for that vessel. This saves significant time for users in triaging and filing email. This feature is in addition to the powerful 'My Messages' filters that are available per user to watch for vessel names and other keywords (trade areas, cargoes, delays, etc.) and present those messages first to users by default. In the photo above on the mobile view you can see the user has three suggestions for this email for filing - just one click and the task is complete without having to drag it to a folder or search for the specific vessel/voyage.

Now in their second year of using AOS Ronayne's have used AOS to produce consistently branded documentation and manage port calls ensuring all costs are accurately accounted. They are now using the system to help them grow their business based on the professional delivery of all documentation.

Building Greener Ships, to Keep the Sea From Rising - The New York Times