Bigger and better

Evolution rather than revolution in the communications sector.

T here are a number of trends appearing that are having an effect on the communications sector, says Ghani Behloul, maritime marketing director for France Telecom Mobile Satellite Communications. “The shipping industry is getting more and more professional and vessels are getting bigger ? as we?ve seen with the building in France of the Queen Mary 2. You also see the same in the cargo sector with large containerships .”

Many companies now prefer to connect the vessel as if it were an element of the office on shore, which is a major evolution. Behloul told The Motor Ship: “More and more shipping companies like to benefit from using the same applications they have in the office ashore and that means that there is an increasing need for transferring data.”

Another trend is that seafarers want to communicate with their families more, which is good for morale and hence improved efficiency and more and more companies are offering crew this facility.

Impact

“The third trend we have observed is the impact of the new regulations regarding security,” says Behloul. “This has involved the installation of new equipment, including communication equipment, that is able to send out alerts or detect a problem and inform the shipping company ashore or the local administration.” The equipment and service provider are working to match such evolutions and offer a suitable product adapted to the needs of each shipping company.

“What is interesting in our industry is that at the moment Inmarsat is not the only network providing communications solutions ? and that?s a really big change,” says Behloul.” France Telecom offers Iridium, which it says is providing very affordable equipment and at very interesting rates that Inmarsat cannot so far reach with Fleet. “We have customers that are very happy with Iridium, especially for voice communications,” explains Behloul. He says that Iridium has a data capability that is equivalent to that of mini-M ? although it is not a very optimised capability ? but if special software such as SkyFile (which France Telecom provides) is used the throughput of the line can be increased. This works by compression and optimised dialogue between the Iridium equipment and the server onshore.

Another option ? Thuraya ?is also highly successful in the land market says Behloul. “Many journalists in the Middle East covering the Iraq war used the Thuraya system. In the past they used to use the mini-M, which is about the size of a laptop, whereas the Thuraya equipment is about the size of a GSM phone. They definitely prefer the small hand-held product to make reports and send data.”

He told The Motor Ship that Thuraya currently has a 9.6 data capability, which corresponds more or less to the Inmarsat B data service. Thuraya only used to have one satellite, but has launched another one, which will extend the coverage. Behloul says that the system is currently under test but it is planned that the product should be available in the next few weeks. Pricing should be around the same as the land version, which is less than a dollar per minute. Behloul says that the equipment price will be around three to four thousand dollars and cheaper than a mini-M.

Cost

Some shipping companies are still not using satellite communications because of the cost of the equipment and the cost of the air-time, and so have only an Inmarsat C and often a radio to cover the voice communications.

It is those vessels that France Telecom hopes will consider the Thuraya offer if they are in the coverage area. The company claims to be the first service provider for Thuraya with about 22% market share and the second largest provider of Iridium services. Behloul says: “We intend to promote the services shipping companies would like access to satellite communications for the first time.”

Another communications option is VSAT, which Behloul describes as “the top level sat comm. Product”. It is said to provide the important benefit of up to 2Mb per second ? a figure unthinkable only three or four years ago.

“The VSAT advantage is that rather than charging per minute or per packet, a certain bandwidth is agreed . So, you rent a capacity to fill with all your needs – whether this is voice, data communications or video conferencing. You can introduce the application you have at your premises and import them onboard to generate large amounts of traffic,” he points out.

VSAT is currently only installed on larger vessels because the equipment is very expensive. However, the price is decreasing says Behloul, but it is still 10 or 20 times the cost of Thuraya or Iridium, and so is reserved for only a certain category of vessels, such as big cruise ships or oil and gas exploration ships.

But with a reduction in the equipment and airtime costs over the last two years France Telecom has seen a new category of vessel opting for the VSAT including tankers and even factory fishing ships.

“It is a very interesting movement that we are observing at the moment with the upper end of the market served by VSAT and the lower end of the market accessing satcoms with Iridium and, probably in the future, Thuraya,” explains Behloul. “Our ambition is to provide the best solution for every segment of the market and have a solution for every type of customer.”

Having control of the costs is, of course, very important to the shipping industry. With France Telecom having fully understood this need for a long time it is providing a range of value added services so that the shipping company, people on shore, or people on the ship can be in control and know the usage and its estimated cost.

Behloul finally told The Motor Ship: “Last year, we improved the traffic information system V2. This is available 24 hours a day via the Internet, allowing the customer to see all the traffic generated by his vessel, with just a two day delay. We have also introduced a system on the Fleet MPDS channel, which allows users to work out whether it is cheaper to send their email via MPDS or ISDN.”