Kyklades Maritime is using a combination of Fleet Xpress and Infinity plus from Navarino, as well as other autonomous technologies that connect over satellite with land-based facilities, to enhance the efficiency of its operations and expand its options for business applications.

According to Nikolaos Kourtalis, ICT manager at Kyklades, 17 of the company’s vessels are using Fleet Xpress and Infinity to secure higher bandwidth and fixed fee pricing. The solutions have enabled Kyklades to maximise its productivity and install new software to monitor its vessels’ engines or for navigation purposes, all of which are also accessible from shore through the FX connection.

“Fleet Xpress has also benefitted our crews during the ongoing pandemic during which time providing a secure, reliable and functional connectivity option for our seafarers has been crucial. FX provided our crews with exactly that in addition to fast, stable bandwidth which we were able to offer them free of charge for much of their communication requirements,” said Kourtalis.

“We chose to install the Sailor 100 FX antenna for our fleet which we have found to be a very reliable solution, and which has not presented any hardware issues. Installation is also straightforward, with simpler cabling than other antenna solutions and with less points of failure.

“To manage and optimise the connectivity that Fleet Xpress provides us with, we have installed Navarino’s Infinity solution. This provides us with a single platform from which we can monitor almost every aspect of our fleet. We can easily track vessels’ positions, quickly apply firewall rules across our fleet as well as synchronise application data and remotely troubleshoot crucial operating systems.

“Infinity additionally provides us with VOIP communications between the fleet and our onshore offices and allows us to fully manage the crew network, as well as having a very useful logging system which helps us to quickly investigate and resolve any issues.

“We have also installed Navarino’s Spectrum service on some of our vessels. As shipping is increasingly relying on digital solutions for the completion of everyday tasks, Spectrum supports our cyber risk management strategy in accordance with the relevant regulations and the best practices that we follow on board our vessels. Spectrum’s asset management, network virtualisation, remote monitoring, software updating mechanism and patching tools are all crucial in order to comply with regulations.

“To conclude, I can say that we are very pleased with both the direct and indirect interactions we enjoy with Navarino. Our overall experience with both their technical support and sales teams has been more than satisfactory and all the products and services provided by Navarino to Kyklades Maritime have very much met our expectations.”

Andreas Dimitriadis, Navarino’s director of strategic partnerships, said: “We at Navarino are very proud to work together with Mr Kourtalis and the Kyklades Maritime team. I am delighted to hear about how our innovative technology services are bringing them real benefits in their daily operations. We are dedicated to developing our portfolio of solutions to meet the needs of the maritime ICT sector and delivering those solutions packaged in a five-star customer experience.”