Democratising data with Kongsberg Vessel Insight

Launched at Nor Shipping, Vessel Insight is designed to provide an affordable vessel analytics infrastructure. While the subject of vessel digitalisation has exploded in popularity, it has remained out of the reach of many organisations thanks to the high investment costs, leaving only the top players to develop formidable in-house systems for their own use.

Speaking with The Motorship, Takle highlights previous experiences in other sectors, which went through the same cycles of digitalisation. “We have seen this is in banking, retail: at the beginning these systems were far ahead because they have proprietary access to the largest amount of data.

“All the large media companies were building their own systems, but very few of them succeeded. Most of them just died, once other platforms proved themselves in the market. Luckily, once this technology is available at a low cost, OPEX reductions are easy to identify.”

Kongsberg was one of a large number of maritime parties to launch a platform, with the announcement of Veracity several years ago. Another was Rolls-Royce, the acquisition of which Kongsberg finalised earlier this year. As it happens, work done on vessel monitoring at R-R has been complimentary to Kongsberg’s own, Takle explains. “We thought there would be more overlap, but as it turns out, R-R’s research was very advanced in some respects but short in others; Kongsberg’s work filled in these gaps.”

The project also benefits from a collaborate approach, Takle says. “Our partnership with DNV GL shows that we are willing to work with our competitors.

“We’re well-positioned because we’re not trying to do everything ourselves. We will stick to our core competencies, and involve other players in the rest.”