KVH: Broadband connectivity necessary to stay ahead of the competition

MIDDLETOWN – The executive vice president of mobile broadband for KVH Industries Inc. recently told guests at the Posidonia maritime conference in Athens, Greece, that 24/7 connectivity between ship and shore has become a business necessity and is not a luxury.
Brent Bruun, KVH’s executive vice president of mobile broadband, and Mike Mitsock, the company’s vice president of marketing, said broadband connectivity is especially important given increasing competition in today’s shipping industry.
KVH operates the mini-VSAT Broadband network, which provides global connectivity to thousands of vessels worldwide.
Mitsock highlighted the major areas for potential operating cost savings and how KVH and its partners focus on big data to address those areas.
“The optimization of significant operational costs, such as fuel, through such measures as route planning and engine maintenance, can lead to sustainably lower overall costs,” Mitsock said.
Connectivity also plays a part in crew retention, Mitsock said.
He discussed evidence from a Crew Connectivity 2015 Survey report by Futurenautics, which stated that “73 percent of respondents said that the level of crew communications services provided onboard did influence their decisions about which shipping company they worked for.”
Bruun said ship owners and ship managers are realizing that transferring volumes of shore-to-ship data or multimedia content on a daily basis is possible through KVH’s multicasting service, IP-MobileCast. The content delivery service allows mini-VSAT Broadband customers who subscribe to receive news, sports and entertainment content with no data transmission costs.
Said Bruun, “Our solution gives users global onboard connectivity, licensed content, affordable content delivery, communications hardware and network management, all backed up with a comprehensive global service and support program.”

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