SmartSea: Turning fleets into intelligent operational networks

SmartSea CEO Kris Vedat argues shipping’s digital future depends less on more sensors than on breaking down data silos and managing fleets as connected operational networks.

The idea that every ship should be treated as an isolated operating environment is becoming obsolete, argues Kris Vedat, CEO of SmartSea.

As vessels become more closely connected to shore teams, ports, suppliers and performance centres, Vedat says the industry needs to stop thinking ship by ship and instead manage fleets as integrated operational networks.

“The future fleet should be treated as one intelligent operational network, allowing expertise, information and lessons learned to be distributed consistently while preserving the authority and judgement of those onboard,” he tells Maritime CEO.

This shift, he says, goes to the heart of what digitalisation in shipping should ultimately achieve.

Ships may increasingly function as nodes within a wider network, but the industry is still failing to extract full value from the data those vessels generate.

The industry must avoid replacing fragmentation with dependency

Vedat estimates shipping probably operationalises less than 20% of its available vessel data.

“Much of that information remains trapped in separate systems or is used retrospectively for reporting rather than real-time decisions,” he says.

The next digital frontier, in his view, is therefore not another wave of sensors, but improving data quality, integration and delivery so existing information becomes a continuous operational advantage.

Vedat believes shipping is overestimating the near-term impact of fully autonomous vessels while underestimating the importance of the infrastructure that allows different technologies to work together.

The less glamorous layers of maritime technology — data orchestration, interoperability and secure ship-to-shore information exchange — could prove considerably more important than the headline-grabbing applications sitting above them.

“The long-term winners may not have the most sophisticated algorithms, but the strongest ability to make maritime data accessible, interoperable and operationally useful,” he says.

Over the next five years, he expects what he terms “autonomous decision ecosystems” to emerge, linking vessels, shore teams and maritime infrastructure.

AI will play a central role, but only when it is fed by harmonised, real-time operational data.

“The real advance,” he maintains, “will not be automating individual tasks, but enabling fleets to make faster, better and increasingly coordinated decisions as a connected operational network.”

The biggest obstacle to scaling maritime technology is structural fragmentation rather than technology or cost, according to Vedat.

Vessel IT, operational technology and connectivity have evolved separately, often over multiple generations of equipment and suppliers. The result is that too many digital projects still become bespoke integration exercises.

“Digital solutions will only scale when the industry adopts common architectures, standard interfaces and repeatable deployment models across entire fleets,” he says.

If Vedat could impose one standard across shipping, it would be a universal maritime data and interoperability framework. He is careful to stress that such a framework should not prescribe a single technology supplier. Instead, it should allow competing systems to communicate through open interfaces, reducing integration costs and limiting proprietary lock-in. Such a model, he argues, could also lay the foundations for a genuine maritime platform economy, where new applications can be plugged into existing infrastructure rather than forcing owners to rebuild their technology stack each time.

The risk, otherwise, is that consolidation among technology vendors simply replaces one problem with another.

“Consolidation should be welcomed where it improves interoperability, but resisted where it restricts data portability or customer choice,” Vedat says. “The industry must avoid replacing fragmentation with dependency.”

Vedat also believes shipping needs to rethink how digital projects are funded.

Capital exists, he says, but confidence remains weaker where project outcomes are difficult to measure and responsibility is spread between owners, operators and vendors. Shared-risk and outcome-based commercial models could help unlock investment.

“Customers need to buy defined results rather than carry all the risk of implementation,” he says.

That means tying digital investment to measurable improvements in efficiency, availability, safety or emissions rather than merely buying another system.

Vedat makes a similar argument when discussing return on investment.

Fuel savings remain an obvious metric, but digital ROI should also include resilience, crew effectiveness, safety, compliance, maintenance, asset longevity and organisational agility.

“Better information can prevent failures, reduce downtime and make scarce expertise available across a fleet,” he points out.

For emissions reduction specifically, Vedat sees some of the strongest immediate returns coming from decision-optimisation platforms covering routing, speed, trim, machinery configuration and arrival planning. New fuels and hardware will ultimately be essential, but operational intelligence can deliver savings across ships already trading today.

That increasingly digital environment will also alter the skills required at sea. By 2035, Vedat expects data literacy to sit alongside traditional maritime competence as a core seafaring skill. Crew will need to interpret digital recommendations, understand automated outputs and, critically, know when human judgement should override the machine.

“The objective is not to turn seafarers into data scientists,” he says, “but to help them operate confidently where maritime experience and machine intelligence meet.”

That balance between technology and maritime understanding also shapes Vedat’s view of vendor risk.

As digital platforms become more deeply embedded in daily operations, owners need to assess not only technical performance but also maritime expertise, interoperability, data portability and exit provisions.

“The greatest risk lies in relying on data and connectivity platforms controlled by vendors that lack a deep understanding of maritime operations,” he concludes.

source : splash247