Since the 2005 mandates by the International Maritime Organization and the U.S. Coast Guard for the implementation of automated information system collision-avoidance technology, AIS has evolved to become the foundation for a growing number of business solutions. From simple vessel tracking and navigational assistance, to homeland security, regulatory and vendor compliance, AIS is rapidly emerging as a fundamental technology in the maritime industry.

The evolution of AIS-based systems identifies future directions for a technology that is simple but in its implications is revolutionizing business in maritime waterways.

See and Be Seen

Originally implemented to permit ships to "see" one another when underway for safety of navigation purposes, technologists quickly realized that vessels transmitting AIS signals could also be "seen" by shore-side monitoring stations that could aggregate the information from all ships in range and display their locations and other key data on charts and maps. In providing simple geographic displays, these innovators made the conceptual leap in recognizing that AIS signals were of interest not only to ships seeking to avoid collisions, but to shore-side personnel seeking to know "where ships are."

This serves a broad array of commercial and governmental objectives, and in the few years since wide-spread AIS signals became available, there have been numerous solutions brought to market. Many of these systems plot data received from AIS signals on a standard map or chart to provide vessel location information. Frequently referred to as Vessel Tracking Systems (VTS), these solutions focus primarily on conveying current vessel locations, and leave it to each user to determine how best to incorporate such data into their existing business practices.

Beyond "Points-on-a-Map"

However, only recently have the next-generation of AIS-based systems that go beyond simply plotting "points-on-a-map" become available. These new solutions deliver actionable maritime business information by incorporating AIS with other sources of industry data to provide a complete vessel reporting system (VRS). The VRS movement is compelling for business and government users alike, since it provides value-added data and analysis that drives specific organizational objectives.

VRS Systems go beyond location-based data to provide real-time and historical information that benefits a wide array of shore-side business users. The key attributes of a VRS are its abilities to:

• Derive business events from AIS signals, including port arrival/departure, terminal arrival/departure, passing by point-of-interest, and vessel alongside.
• Store business events and core AIS data in a data warehouse that is optimized for both real-time alerts as well as historic reporting.
• Provide a user-friendly interface that allows business users to answer questions and solve business problems through interaction with the data warehouse.

A VRS harvests data from millions of AIS ship signals each day. These ship signals are analyzed, interpreted and transformed into key data structures. A professionally-managed VRS will then archive these data structures for many years, ensuring that users can benefit from not only real-time information, but also historic data to support a variety of business needs, from compliance activities, to negotiation, collaboration or even litigation.

Harnessing a VRS to Drive Business Intelligence

The value of a VRS is in its capabilities to push information to users through alerting and exception reporting as well as its ability to respond to a wide variety of information requests drawing on extensive waterway history. These two perspectives, real-time push information and historic performance information, allow users to manage day-to-day activities, schedule resources, monitor activities, confirm actions and pursue longer-range strategies, both through specific review of previous events and performance and trend reporting.

A comprehensive VRS drives business benefits for a variety of different maritime stakeholders. These stakeholders leverage the combination of perfect transparency and visibility of all commercial vessels with the historic reporting provided by the VRS data warehouse. The result is compelling – maritime business users who can harness the power of VRS to increase revenue, decrease costs, increase efficiency and drive compliance with vendors, partners and other waterway users. The VRS movement is still in its infancy. New opportunities to leverage the power of a VRS are being discovered by commercial and government users each day. Key users are now beginning to document actual value derived from VRS in the form of industry white papers and press reports.

A Real-World VRS Success Story

In 2005, major users of the Sabine-Neches in waterway in Southeast Texas joined forces to identify and deploy a collaborative web-based system. The mission: to significantly increase efficiency of the waterway. Demurrage costs alone exceeded $25 million per year, with additional operational inefficiencies coming from poor scheduling and resource allocation as well as confusion over contractual commitments. The impacts affected wide variety of stakeholders, from terminals and vessel operators, to service providers and government agencies.

In response, the Sabine users implemented PortVision in the summer of 2006. The results of the web-based service have been compelling. One major terminal estimated that hard-dollar savings exceeded $1 million per year with the system. Others are reporting significant changes in the way they do business, with more accurate scheduling and more confidence that vessels will be where they should be as expected. For the first time, waterway users have access to real-time, near-perfect information about vessel and terminal events. PortVision also allowed the Sabine subscribers access to business intelligence to drive better decision-making leading to increase efficiency, reduced costs, and enhanced safety and security for all waterway users.

The Continuing Evolution of VRS

The emerging industry of AIS based information systems continues to evolve. This will likely continue as shore-side use of AIS becomes pervasive throughout the maritime industry, aided by a number of commercial and government initiatives. The U.S. Coast Guard National AIS (NAIS) initiative will significantly enhance MDA for security but also will rely on a private satellite data network that brings with it the promise of leveraging AIS for long-range tracking of vessels at sea. This is an exciting time for the maritime industry as technology advances and more opportunities arise to drive real business value through the adoption of VRS.

About the author: Dean Rosenberg is the President of PortVision, a comprehensive, Web-based communication system that provides real-time information on any merchant vessel and terminal operation in the U.S. at the click of a mouse. PortVision incorporates Automatic Identification System (AIS) technology in its patent-pending solution to give users clear visibility of vessel and terminal operations at their fingertips. For more information info@portvision.com

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