Minerva Marine (managing 54 tankers), Minerva Gas (managing five LNGCs) and Minerva Dry (managing 11 bulkers and three containerships), have deployed Dualog’s data transfer service - Dualog Drive.
With this update, all three shipmanagement companies can now automatically send up to 1 mill files to and from their vessels each week.
The fleets operate worldwide and as such, a fast and reliable file sharing system was considered vital to their operations.
Minerva's daily data exchange requirements include - software distribution to keep all on board systems up-to-date; shore-to-vessel enterprise resource planning (ERP) database synchronisation and the ability to distribute large training videos, together with having prompt access to other types of data, such as videos from CCTV on board, VDR and ECDIS playback data.
Ilias Vlachogiannis, Minerva Marine’s Head of Fleet ICT, said: “Our fleet's data flow capability required more control, as it was difficult to manage and troubleshoot, with multiple manual processes both on board and in the offices.
“Large files transfers were often facing interruptions making difficult their delivery on time due to connection issues. These were the key reasons we began exploring alternatives for data transfer within our fleet,” he explained.
Minerva has been using Dualog’s maritime email service for a year, and being familiar with its environment, was able to easily adopt a new file transfer tool into its fleet. Dualog developed Dualog Drive in collaboration with vessel IT teams worldwide, ensuring it seamlessly integrates into the data flow of all the fleets.
Eftihia Benaki, ICT Manager at Minerva Marine, added: “We saved dozens of man-hours per month, due to the process being automated. Configuring and troubleshooting have become much easier because we can see all fleet transfers in one interface. We have also reduced our manual work significantly, and I believe we can still do more.”
“Because of the Dualog technology, we can transfer large files without worrying about interruptions, and we know that all files will be delivered on time. It feels like we’re always online,” stressed Vlachogiannis.
Kyriakos Papapolydorou, Dualog’s Regional Manager, added: “Our objective was to reduce the pain of manual processes of data transfer between ship and shore, while safeguarding smooth operations in diverse environments. We're glad to hear that Minerva has experienced an increase in productivity in such a short period of time.”
