Golden
Union chooses Inmarsat Fleet F77 after successful maritime trials
Posted: 10 February 2003
London — Golden Union, the leading Greek
shipping operator, has chosen Inmarsat Fleet F77 as its preferred
satellite communications system, following a successful maritime
field evaluation (MFE) with Inmarsat and Nera at the end of 2002.
As part of the trial, a Nera Fleet F77 terminal was installed on
the CIC
Pride, a 172,000 Dwt dry bulk carrier. The ship spends most of its
time at sea, sailing long-distance routes between South America
and Europe, which made it a highly suitable candidate for an MFE.
OTESAT-Maritel also partnered with Inmarsat in the trial.
George Gabriel, Director of Golden Union, oversaw the trial on-board
the vessel. “Part of the Master’s role is to write and
send detailed monthly reports to the company’s operations
centre, and this is likely to increase in line with ISM reporting
requirements,” he said. “There are also a number of
other reports sent from the vessel — such as the regular 32-page
reports sent by the Chief Engineer — so good communications
between ship and shore are critical, and I was interested to see
how Inmarsat Fleet F77 could improve this”.
“There were two challenges that Fleet F77 had to overcome
in the MFE. It had to prove that it is cost-effective, and it had
to win over technophobic ship personnel, many of whom had never
even used a PC,” he said. “I’m very pleased to
say that it passed both areas with flying colours, and we will now
be specifying Inmarsat Fleet F77 as our terminal of choice”.
Following a quick installation, the CIC Pride switched its ship-to-shore
communications to Inmarsat Fleet F77 with no problems, and the vessel
was soon investigating new applications and functionality —
such as real-time instant messaging over MPDS and the transfer of
digital imagery which could be used in emergency engineering situations,
as well as enhanced access for crew to email and web services.
The successful experience of using Inmarsat Fleet F77 has encouraged
Golden Union to introduce more efficient methods of communicating
ship-to-shore, and being less dependant on the telex or fax transmissions
which the company currently uses.
The vessels in the Golden Union fleet may also be retrofitted with
ECDIS, and Fleet F77 will allow electronic chart updates and corrections
to be downloaded in real time or additional functions such as weather
routing information to be reviewed.
Importantly for Golden Union, the Fleet F77 terminal was also found
to be very cost-effective and easy-to-use.
“We saw the tangible benefits of using Inmarsat Fleet F77
instantly,” said George. “Not only will we be keeping
it on-board the CIC Pride, but we will be installing it on all our
new builds from now on. We’re a traditional operator, and
Inmarsat is helping us take a significant step forward with our
ship communications.”
“The MFE we conducted with Golden Union was a good example
of how we successfully collaborate with manufacturer, LESO and customer
to get the best result — with Inmarsat, NERA, OTESAT-Maritel
and Golden Union working very closely,” said Piers Cunningham,
Business Development Manager for Maritime at Inmarsat.
“The Greek shipping market is known to be quite conservative,
and takes a lot of persuading before changing its established practices,”
he said. “So the decision by Golden Union to adopt Fleet F77
as its preferred communications system is a strong testimony to
the achievements of the joint effort and the winning Fleet solution.”
Ottar Bjastad, Business Manager of Maritime Market at Nera, said:
"We are very pleased that Golden Union has evaluated and selected
the Nera Fleet F77 terminal as the preferred satellite communications
system for their fleet.
The field evaluation environment and maritime conditions provided
an ideal situation to test our equipment and we are delighted to
report that the Nera Fleet F77 terminal stood up to the expectations
of a high-quality and user-friendly solution that Golden Union required."
Inmarsat
- Inmarsat Ltd owns and operates a unique global mobile satellite
network and delivers its communications solutions through a worldwide
network of approximately 260 distributors and other service providers
operating in over 80 countries to end users in the maritime, land
and aeronautical sectors.
- Inmarsat Ltd has a portfolio of mobile satellite solutions,
including
voice, fax, intranet and Internet access and other data services.
- Inmarsat Ltd has more than 22 years of experience in designing,
implementing and operating satellite networks.
- At the end of June 2002, approximately 250,000 terminals were
registered to access Inmarsat Ltd’s services.
- Inmarsat Ltd is also supported by partners in the fields of
equipment manufacture, software provision and systems integration.
- Inmarsat Ltd is a subsidiary of Inmarsat Ventures plc.
- Inmarsat is the exclusive global partner of the FIA World Rally
Championships.
Visit http://www.inmarsat.com
for more information.
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