Anglo-Eastern CEO Bjorn Hojgaard: “The ship will become a seamless extension of the office, where members of the team just happen to be closer to the machinery.”
One of the world’s main ship managers, Hong Kong headquartered Anglo-Eastern, plans to roll out SpaceX’s Starlink Maritime broadband service on a minimum of 200 vessels by year-end, with extra to comply with. The firm says that, initially, it has positioned a preliminary order protecting a dozen vessels of varied ship varieties and buying and selling patterns, in order that the service will be absolutely trialed throughout numerous eventualities earlier than a broader roll-out within the coming months.
“We quietly started our journey a year ago, when Starlink first announced its ‘RV’ service. Once installed on several vessels, we knew immediately it was a game-changer,” mentioned Anglo-Eastern CIO Torbjorn Dimblad. “Overnight, these ships became as connected as any office or home, affording the crew unprecedented access to friends and family while enabling an entirely new level of collaboration between ship and shore.”
Dimblad sees the introduction of Starlink Maritime as arriving at an ideal time.
“Part of our digitalization journey was to standardize our hardware on board,” says Dimbland. “Since 2020, we have commissioned over 600 data centres and replaced 5,000 workstations across the fleet. The underlying infrastructure is now in place to leverage the accelerated connectivity”.
At the identical time, satellite tv for pc service suppliers have reported vital will increase within the demand for bandwidth, fueled by the pandemic in addition to new know-how options on board. Starlink provides terabytes of community capability, with low latency at a aggressive worth.
“Initially, all of that additional bandwidth will go to doing what we do today, only more of it and faster” mentioned Anglo-Eastern CEO Bjorn Hojgaard. “The addition of Starlink’s LEO community – and OneWeb and Project Kuiper thereafter – will change life on board in a manner that we’ve got by no means skilled within the historical past of transport. Soon seafarers will likely be ‘always-on’, having fun with the identical connectivity that we ashore have been used to. The ship will turn into a seamless extension of the workplace, the place members of the group simply occur to be nearer to the equipment.
“If an issue arises on board that requires support, the vessel team can launch a Teams video call to ask for a hand,” says Hojgaard. “During off-hours, the latest movies or TV shows can be streamed live from home… The possibilities are endless, and I believe this will help make our industry safer and more attractive for current and future generations.”
