Passenger vessel shipmanagers are boosting their offerings with an increased focus on remote monitoring and data analytics, with business increasingly buoyant within the expedition cruise sector
Passenger vessel shipmanagers are boosting their offerings with an increased focus on remote monitoring and data analytics, with business increasingly buoyant within the expedition cruise sector
Shipmanagers are boosting their IT offerings to make their services more efficient and capitalising on fast-growing niche sectors, including expedition cruise ships.
These are areas Cruise Management International (CMI) is focusing on. CMI has grown quickly under the management of its president and chief executive Jim Barreiro de León. The company had 11 cruise ships under management when he joined the company in May 2017 – this is set to grow to 19 vessels under contract by the end of this year and reach 25 vessels by the end of 2021 as Sunstone Ships continues its newbuild programme in China.
While CMI manages SunStone’s ships, it manages many third-party ships as well. Recent vessel contracts include Bahamas Paradise Cruise Line’s Grand Classica, Gemini, Semester at Sea World Odyssey, operating as Deutschland in the summer for Phoenix Reisen, and the passenger ferry Kydon for America Cruise Ferries.
It is also set to manage SunStone Ships’ first newbuild, Greg Mortimer, due to be delivered in August 2019, and handed over to its charterer Aurora Expeditions shortly thereafter. Shipowner SunStone Ships is the parent company of CMI, which provides shipmanagement services to all of SunStone’s ships. Sister ship management company CMI Leisure provides hospitality/catering services.
Mr Barreiro de León said while the company did not want to be restricted to the expedition sector, it was an expert within this cruise area, as well as in the small ship sector. “A lot of small ship segment cruise ships are adventure or soft expedition ships going to warmer places – we really understand that small ship segment very well.”
Mr Barreiro de León highlighted the benefits of being owned by a shipowner. “We have a value proposition that as a boutique ship manager and also a shipowner we understand better the pressure points that these smaller operators experience. We tailor-make our services as we understand small ships and expedition operations, we engage with the charterer’s staff on board by ensuring we deliver a heightened passenger experience. Our crew are dedicated to our organisation and we take a transparent approach with our clients in managing their vessels. We do not apply cross-sales tactics like the larger companies and we allow our clients to benefit from our economy of scale”. He continued “This was the intention of our principals since the very first day they started this organisation and I am proud to continue this tradition.”
He added “We want to partner with niche operators that see the value of using a company like CMI. We can provide a lot of scalability to the benefits of our clients, our insurance premiums and coverage is the best I have seen in the industry, and we are solution driven every step of the way”.
Meanwhile, CMI Ship Management is undergoing a thorough automation process, a main lynchpin of which is adopting the ship management software, InfoShip, provided by IB USA Inc. “This is the essential component, connecting all moving parts together, the purchasing, reporting and compliance modules and interfacing them with our accounting system.”
CMI has been customising it to its needs and rolling it out over the past year. It will be completed by the end of February this year. Mr Barreiro de León highlighted multiple benefits. “It removes the manual process and through the integration into our system it will add to our solution-driven management approach. The system is cloud-based and available to our fleet management cells through a mobile app. This will further improve our services, create efficiencies and accuracy in reporting to our clients”.
Another major focus for CMI has been to establish fleet agreements with new “strategic partners to support us with our growth and infrastructure as we expand our fleet”, stated Mr Barreiro de León. Besides partnering with the online crew database provider, Crew Inspector, who combines CMI’s crew database, contracting, payroll and document issuing, they also signed an agreement with communications service provider Speedcast. CMI changed their strategy regarding crewing and training and has signed up with new crew agencies in Odessa and Manila, who are now offering career development opportunities for its crew and enhanced crew engagement policies, through a CMI customised programme to ensure crew is taken care of while at home.
“We are partnering with organisations and people that continue to operate on the cutting edge of technology, and that share our vision for ‘total lifecycle ship-management’, ensuring that our clients benefit instantly without having to make major investments themselves for this type of infrastructure requirement.”
Data analytics advances
V.Group has applied remote monitoring, data analytics and communications technologies to improve key performance indicators (KPIs) for procurement, certification, defect reporting and applying best working practices within a fleet of vessels.
These technologies, along with collaborative thinking, were adopted for the Fleet Cell of the Future prototype developed this year for technical management and marine support services.
V.Group ran a testbed of the fleet cell model in Glasgow, Scotland this year covering management of a fleet of 17 ships.
“We enhanced technical management, changed the layout, improved our processes and introduced more KPIs to measure the output of the fleet cell,” said former V.Group director of strategy, innovation and transformation Jon Key.
“We then looked at how people communicated with each other, worked together and solved problems,” he told Passenger Ship Technology during the SMM exhibition in Hamburg, Germany. Since this interview, he has left V.Ships.
He explained that the fleet cell is open to new approaches, has quicker communications and recall of data between shipmanagers and crew on board ships within the cell. “We have developed more efficient ways of monitoring the ships,” said Mr Key, who added there were challenges still to overcome.
Satellite communications enable electronic documentation and data transmissions between the fleet cell and managed vessels. “Increasing requirements for data means we need higher bandwidth for uploading and downloading,” he explained.
“Many vessels do not have high tech communications, so it is challenging to collect data from these ships.” Mr Key said there were methods for overcoming these challenges for owners and managers.
“We need to retrofit communications for the level of analysis we are heading to,” he explained. “We are grappling with communications and collaborating with customers on the hardware on their vessels.”
Another way is to keep raw data on the ship instead of sending it all in packages. “Data can remain on vessels and be analysed on board,” said Mr Key. “Data can be integrated, and a selection can be brought back to shore.” This data can be converted to information on board for the crew to use to make efficiency improvements and improve safety and reliability.
“We do not need all of the data at our fleet cell. The best place for this data is to enhance decision making on board,” he said. This can be displayed on dashboards on the bridge for crew to analyse operational data more effectively.
“Crews need actionable and operational information, while onshore management needs different information to drive their decisions,” said Mr Key.
Once information is transferred from the ships it is displayed and analysed by shipmanagers as the fleet cell has multiple high-definition screens displaying vessel status, performance and positioning data.
V.Group’s fleet cell of the future is about improving teamwork and decision making. It has introduced daily meetings and provided everyone in the cell with the permission and responsibility to solve problems.
“It is about changing our workflows and empowering everyone on the team to try new things and see if they make a difference to the results we deliver for our clients,” said Mr Key.
V.Group is introducing more fleet cells to improve efficiency in other shipmanagement teams. It could have 45 in place to cover the whole of the managed fleet.
“We want to have every fleet cell working with the same technology and sharing experiences with colleagues around the world,” said Mr Key.
“We have a pipeline of technology we will be trying out in the fleet cells. We would then adopt new technology once it has proven it is effective.”
V.Group has an innovation portal to assist technology evaluation and collaborates with universities and other institutions to develop ways for better data analytics and fleet remote monitoring.
Digitalising data
“We use a range of data for analytics, including noon reports, ship position, machinery condition monitoring and fuel efficiency,” said Mr Key. He expects more ships will transmit digital data as paper records are phased out.
“The problem with paper records is they are inefficient and can have an impact on safety,” he explained. “Putting this online would be better for seafarers, clients and provides faster access to the information which adds more value than manual paper pushing.”
Digital information can be viewed outside the fleet cell in real-time on mobile devices using V.Group’s ShipSure 2.0 application.
This enables clients to monitor vital data such as fuel consumption, sailing speed and conditions at sea. They can also check whether planned maintenance is overdue, and why, and request copies of test certificates.
ShipSure can generate critical spares alerts, compare budgeted running costs against real expenditure and generate invoices for procurement.
CCS unveils landmark refit
Meanwhile, Columbia Cruise Services (CCS) has boosted its role within cruise management. In January 2015 Schoeller Holdings launched the new, standalone Columbia company focused solely on cruise: Columbia Cruise Services. In the three years since then it has benefited from having a strong sister company behind it (Cypress-based Columbia Shipmanagement), which allows for economies of scale. At the end of 2017 CCS, which has grown from 10 to 60+ people, became a German registered company with its headquarters in Hamburg.
It has revealed a landmark project: it announced that Marella Cruises’ sixth vessel is joining the CCS operation upon the management handover in Cadiz, Spain. It will undergo a complete technical overhaul and rebranding under CCS supervision at Navantia Shipyard.
CCS said the eight-week period will be the most expensive refit in the history of CCS. It added “the project will include large-scale painting works to meet the Marella Cruises’ brand standards, extensive glass and Bolidt refurbishments, upgrades to balconies and life-saving equipment.”
The first adults-only ship in the Marella fleet will be tailored to meet the needs of its targeted clientele – couples, friends and groups. The size of the Veranda premium sunbathing area will be doubled compared to the one on its sister ship, Marella Explorer. It will also feature three new venues and a 102-m2 Royal Suite.
Marella Explorer 2 is scheduled to welcome its first passengers on 2 April this year.
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