Wilson Ship Management has decided to fit its fleet of more than 45 ships with Iridium satellite terminals in a move to provide a cost-effective integrated Ship Security Alert System (SSAS) and e-mail solution.
Dualog AS is supplying the hardware and software for the Wilson ships under a service contract with Applied Satellite Technology (AST), an Iridium service provider. The Dualog solution is designed to integrate all available communication technologies into a single package. The software automatically compresses messages and selects the most cost-effective routing for transmission. The system's advanced data handling mechanism can be set up to automatically integrate shipboard systems seamlessly with those ashore, ensuring problem free exchange of data files.
"We initially installed Dualog's Iridium-based system on 13 ships," said Torunn Aamoth, IT manager of Wilson Ship Management. "We have been very pleased with the results, and we are now proceeding to upgrade the full fleet." "The integrated shipboard communication system satisfies the IMO carriage requirements for SSAS and also provides an integrated solution for the ships' total e-mail and data communication requirements," said Kristina Garfjell Kantola, international sales manager of Dualog AS.
"Iridium's continuing growth in the maritime satellite communications sector is largely driven by the value-added technology developed by our business partners, such as Dualog and AST," said Don Thoma, executive vice president of Iridium Satellite.
