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technology from land at sea. Companies are connecting their vessels by LAN and

WAN and data communication has in- creased dramatically.

Where do you see opportunities for growth in your sector?

Einshøj, Intellian Commercial shipping is still the most promising growth market looking ahead although the offshore sector still represents this prime market for the SatCom sector in 2011.

Frost, GE Satcom Growth op- portunities are clearly within the com- mercial shipping sector. These include: global coverage of high speed services at a flat rate, a range of included services and an ability to support an ever growing suite of commercial management appli- cations to ensure a ship’s efficient opera- tion.

Meijer, Stratos We see opportunity for continual growth in crew-welfare serv- ices. There also will be lots of opportu- nity for growth wherever our communications solutions can support IT services. This includes remote manage- ment – which allows headquarters per- sonnel to manage the ship’s computers without visiting the vessel. With Fleet-

Broadband, engineers now can achieve high-performance, direct remote access to the ship’s computer terminals, the

FleetBroadband terminal and the onboard firewall via popular remote-support ap- plications. In the future, we also expect an even greater number of operators to use FleetBroadband for engine-perfor- mance analysis and emissions monitor- ing, to help reduce fuel costs and comply with emissions regulations.

Baez, KVH Global demand for maritime communications continues to grow steadily, primarily driven by the oil and gas and commercial shipping mar- kets. Fishing is an additional subsegment of the commercial market that is gener- ating strong demand, and we believe it to be an up-and-coming niche market. We also expect the leisure market to continue growing steadily with the introduction of new products and services, seasonal rate plans, and smaller VSAT solutions.

Medcalf, Broadpoint There are several areas that have opportunity for growth. One area is international growth, like many other industries, SatCom is seeing the globalization of its industry.

Many of the companies that SatCom services such as the Energy and Marine have moved beyond their normal geo- graphic boundaries and have interna- tional locations that needs communication services. These interna- tional locations are also not the normal that we have seen in the last couple of years but areas such as the Antarctica.

Another area of growth is technology/software applications. Many companies are turning to new software applications to better manage their busi- ness. Many of these applications have large files that need to be moved from re- mote locations to onshore offices and the only medium to do that is VSAT.

In your opinion, what has been the biggest driver for improved satellite communication services between ship and shore?

Oro, Ship Equip In our opinion it is the ship owners desire for more billable days/fewer days off hire giving increased bottom line profit. This may come as a surprise to some but here is why: The im-

February 2011 www.marinelink.com 43

Intellian

Søren

Einshøj

Our VSAT product portfolio will con- tinue towards completion both to- wards smaller Ku-bands in addition to C-bands.

Harris CapRock

Pal Jensen

Captains can improve efficiencies of their day-to-day vessel operations and save valuable hours by leverag- ing real-time applications such as the company’s ERP system

MTN

Jonathan

Weintraub

Over the next 5 to 10 years, I expect to see more development of new satellite frequencies, which will allow users to communicate with higher bandwidths and smaller antennas.

KVH

Patricio

Baez

The primary challenge is a wide- spread misconception that satellite communications systems are bulky, expensive, and unreliable. That just isn’t the case anymore.

KVH’s V7.