Wessels Reederei GmbH & Co. KG. Arno de Groot , IT Manager

Ladies and Gentlemen,

welcome at the Digital Ship Conference 2012. My Name is Arno de Groot , IT Manager of Wessels Reederei. Last year

I was sitting relaxed in one of these rows listening to the case studies of company Peter Doehle and others. I was a little surprised about the question of Julie Ann Chan as she asked if we are interested in talking as well here to others and explaining about our daily doing. Thank you to the people of Digital Ship getting this chance here today.

The impressing lectures of the last year led as well to questions on our side: •Which type of our vessels requires what kind of communication system?•Which data will be sent additionally in the future? But before I will explain our solutions I will first let you know who we are and what our drivers are.

I will not spend too much time explaining who we are. At the next few minutes I will roughly show some details of our Company. If there is more interest in our Company and you like to read more about us please visit

www.wessels.de

The Company Wessels Reederei

Introduction

The Wessels Reederei is a Shipping Company which is family-owned with a long tradition in maritime shipping.In the 1970s after his seagoing career, Dr. Gerhard Wessels designed the river/sea-going ships known as cargo liners that formed the basis of a lot of modern coasters–ships that today are in service throughout the world as bulk cargo and container ships.

Management

In 2004 - the year of the company‘s 25th anniversary - Dr. Gerhard Wessels passed his shares of the company to his son Gerd Wessels. Dipl.-Ing. Gerd Wessels became managing partner of Wessels Reederei GmbH & Co. KG.

The Company Wessels Reederei

The Company Wessels Reederei

Management

The change of the management led as well to a change of the future activities of our company. The fleet was renewed with 12 Multi Purpose Vessels of the Rhine M Series with a deadweight of 3675 mt at a draft of 5.49 m. But that was not the only focus of Mr. Gerd Wessels. In 2007 the cooperation with Skysails started to introduce a propulsion support by using a Kite of 160 sqm.

Skysails

This was the first cargo ship retrofitting in the world with a Skysails System and one step of reducing emissions while the vessel is steaming. We are proud to say that we are one of the first shipping companies who are using this kind of technology.The positive results of the MV Michael A were the reason that Wessels decided to install the Skysails SKS160 Kite System on the New Buildings MV Theseus,MV Telamon and MV Peleus. To Skysails I will come back later on.

The Company Wessels Reederei

The Fleet

The fleet of our Company is alltogether today 45 vessels.

The Company Wessels Reederei

Software

Software to reduce costs

Enough from talking about our structure. I will now turn to the software. In the last quarter of 2003 we started from a very rough idea. We searched for an alternative to bring down the Inmarsat C monthly cost of our fleet. The system was modified step by step to a more cost efficient system of our company with assistance of GlobeWireless.

Software

Software to reduce costs

After a trial with two suppliers, Iridium Terminals were rolled out to all vessels of our fleet.The monthly cost of Inmarsat C dropped from a few hundreds US$ to less then US$ 100. All together we had reduced the email communication costs by more than 50%. That was also possible through the so called Ring Page Service of Company Globe Wireless.

Iridium

Software to reduce costs

With Standard Iridium Terminals the vessel only will connect when there is an email message available in the ship’s email box. This reduces the costs dramatically. To specify a little what we are talking about: When you schedule a connection every 60 minutes, that will create around US$ 200 monthly only with empty connections.

Software

Software to reduce costs

Our costs using Iridium Standard Terminals are less then US$ 200 per month per vessel including all data and monthly fees today.

Software

Software to reduce costs

Additionally, the company forms were modified. The forms were transformed from default Microsoft Office Forms Format to the Globe Wireless Globe Forms Format.

Software

Globe Forms

This software transfers only the data of the form. The size of a complete A4 page with about 180 data fields creates a volume of about 2 kb. The origin file size which is uncompressed 47 kb is compressed only 16 kb. But now with 2 kb it is pretty small and we use this software to transfer the most important data.

Software

Forms with Adobe

These two technologies helped us to bring down the costs to a minimum of the value they had before.

After some years of fruitful partnership with Globe Wireless we were looking for a development of our forms. Using Globe Forms requires to create the Template in Word e.g.

Software

Forms with Adobe

Then it needed to be transformed to PDF and in the last step it gets its final format:

Globe Forms Template File.

All these steps require to work highly accurate and in the setup we are talking about three files for each form revision.

Software

Adobe Acrobat 7

To reduce the workload in our com-pany and to avoid mistakes in the forms format changes, we decided to go a new way. Globe uses Adobe Acrobat V7 in combination with GlobeForms V2.x till 3.x with the vessels of our fleet. That was a good product in 2005 and it worked smoothly.

Software

Adobe Reader X

But Adobe’s development of the Reader opens today much more possibilities then in the years before when we started to use Adobe Creator 7. Today the Reader is a powerful tool and we developed new company forms based on Adobe Reader 10.

Software

Adobe Reader X

That has a few advantages for us. Adobe Reader is a free software (No license fee). The only software to be installed is the Adobe Reader which is more or less self explanatory. These new forms do no longer require a third transformation and another file format. There is no additional software necessary aboard.

Software

Adobe Reader X

It is just the Reader with additional code inside the form. This is simplifying the usage for the crew members. Only one button remains:

- send to email

Nothing more. We want to avoid that our ship commands spend time with additional software when not necessary.

Software

Adobe Reader X

To support the crew, some data are transferred automatically inside this form when they choose their vessel’s name. In this form for example it will insert the type of the main engine. Additionally, it will only allow to enter data in the fields that are required for that type of engine.

Software

Adobe Reader X Database Storage

With Acrobat Reader 10 we have now developed the forms of our company to the latest Adobe Standard. We receive the data of these forms in our office in two different ways.

1.Same form format the crew uses aboard, PDF

2.Data are transferred to a database which we are using for filtering purposes.

Software

Adobe Reader X / Oliver Steigleder

My colleague Mr. Oliver Steigleder approved Acrobat Professional who has developed this system will explain to everyone who is interested this system after this presentation in one available meeting room.

Or visit our office in Haren/Ems.

Phone:+49-5932-501-0

E-mail:steigleder@wessels.de

SoftwareSoftware Email Front End

Reducing forms software to the minimum we expect a better acceptance of our crew members as well.

In addition to this, we are using Outlook as mail front end. This gives us the possibility to use available default interfaces. With Microsoft MAPI the default email client opens a new email message and attaches the forms data directly to the mail.

Hardware

Fleet 33 Terminals

The first time when we used Fleet 33 Terminals for data communications we expected better data transfer because of a more powerful hardware. The technology switch to systems with active antennas was a great development. Iridium which we use as well only has non active antennas.

Software /Dualog

It went on as you may expect it already. The data transfer rate was at the beginning with the software we used 4800baud, already the double value of what Iridium offered. But projected value was 9600baud in theory. That is good for the air time provider but bad for the customer using only half of the speed. After some investigations, we changed to Dualog’s Connection Suite. Then we got maximum data speed.

Dualog Connection Suite Software Email Back End

Software /Dualog

Software Email Back End

But we were not satisfied with our monthly invoices. Especially in the guarantee period a vessel has more Emails to be transferred. The cost did rise compared with Iridium to abt. 600 to 1100 US$ monthly. Then our provider suggested to bring down the cost by using MPDS. We had some doubts.

Software /Dualog

Software Email Compression

And we started a test with two software suppliers. As a result we found out that Dualog’s Connection Suite solves what we like to be solved. The data volume was reduced with higher compression values. The monthly cost went down to 400 to 500 US$. And this invoice value already includes the Dualog monthly software fee!

Software /Dualog

Remote Configuration

Now it is easy for us to change settings from the office with Dualog.net interface. It offers as well additional functions like file synchronizations. And, very important: we are able to monitor when the vessel did connect the last time to send and receive its email or configuration changes like updates of Black- and Whitelist for example.

Software /Dualog

Dualog.net / Office Interface

Here is now one example for pending messages which are visible for each vessel if selected. You are able as well to identify the sender, size including date and time when the email was sent.

Hardware

Fleetbroadband

Advantages

-Better network quality than Fleet33

-IP Protocol

-Better connectivity to other systems

-Public IP possible

-Included data volume contracts keep data consumption and monthly cost’s under control

-Sim card cut-off-data limits possible

Hardware

Fleetbroadband

Disadvantages

-Always on requires traffic control

-Internet usage to be controlled

-IP Handset blocks one LAN Port

-Powerful internal protection missing

-¼ MB charged by Inmarsat with every connection that is built up from a Fleetbroadband Terminal

Hardware

Fleetbroadband

These before mentioned reasons led on our side to install hardware firewalls. With these firewalls we allow only this so called wanted traffic. In our case at the moment it is just Email. But we put the focus not only on the today’s necessary traffic. We like to be prepared as well for future developments.

Hardware

Firewall Hardware

Two manufacturers:

LANCOM, STONEGATE we decided to install these two because of:

•Long time experiences in protection of unwanted traffic

•Competence in support outside the default setup environments

•Remote support from our office possible

Hardware

Lancom 1751 UMTS

More than just a Firewall

•Router inside switches automatically to UMTS/GSM network when coverage is available

•Additional external antenna possible

•Lancom Public Spot support with additional Lancom hardware

•Dualog Connection Suite supported

Hardware

Firewall Stonegate FW315

Advantages

•Default GSM/UMTS Wifi Sticks are supported

•Close contact to manufacturer Stonegate

•Central remote management from our office

•Dualog Connection Suite supported

Dualog CorePro Firewall

Dualog CorePro Firewall

We decided to install the Core Pro Software Firewall at the smaller vessels of our fleet. The installation and configuration time is less than the time needed to be spent with the hardware firewall with integrated router. This has to be considered as well. Another reason is that these vessels do not arrive very often at ports near our office. Travelling costs are in these cases higher than with container vessels which have fixed schedules.

Fuel Monitoring SkySails Fuel-Performance-Monitor

The SkySails Performance Monitor is a system for optimizing ship operations. It is designed to monitor and adjust operating parameters (fuel consumption). The core functions of the SkySails Performance Monitor include a display of the ship's efficiency which contains: travel speed, recommendations for economically optimized ship operation and a set of forms for voyage and position reports.

Fuel Monitoring The SkyPM window

The SkyPM window is divided into three sections. The main view screen of the SkySails Performance Monitor contains all relevant parameters for the monitoring of the fuel consumption. The values are recorded every 10 minutes. The recommended economical speed is displayed as a green line in the "Ship Speed" chart. The speed curve of the last 60 minutes is shown as a black line in the "Ship Speed" chart.

Fuel Monitoring This was only a short excerpt of the Skysails Performance Monitor System which is currently in use on our MV Theseus. The recorded values are stored in a database to create reports for the fleet management of the vessel‘s owner. For further information, please contact company Skysails, the manufacturer. Sales Department:

Mr. Niels Finn

Phone: +49 40 70 299 303

niels.finn@skysails.de

The End

Thank you for listening !

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