NAVTOR joins forces with Weathernews International
Global e-navigation leader NAVTOR and Weathernews inc.(WNI), the world's largest private weather service company, have signed a collaboration agreement. The contract will see NAVTOR significantly upgrading its weather information offering within its route planning software NavStation, while also working with the Japanese headquartered firm to develop a ground-breaking artificial intelligence (AI) routing service. This, NAVTOR claims, could revolutionise route planning, efficiency and safety within the maritime industry.
Initially the agreement will see WNI providing an enhanced resolution of weather data for NAVTOR, with the addition of new types of weather information – covering areas such as tropical cyclones and weather fronts – delivering a more comprehensive service for NavStation users. This will be followed by the integration of WNI’s Shipping Weather Service Fleet Management platform into NavStation. This offers a host of benefits including Optimum Ship Routing, to save fuel and reduce costs, and optimise for route safety and speed, and Fleet Monitoring, with daily analysis of ship efficiency, alongside detailed auditing capabilities.
The road to AI route planning is a key part of that voyage. NAVTOR and WNI will work together, using their combined wealth of operational and weather data as a platform, to create the world’s first AI routing service. Details of the project remain confidential, but essentially a new software tool will be created that transforms data into detailed, reliable and optimised decision-making tools with real-time capabilities.
NAVTOR will unveil the prototype of the WNI integrated NavStation at Sea Japan in April, with the official release scheduled for June this year. Details of the on-going AI development will be released at a later stage.
NAVTOR launched NavStation in 2014, allowing navigators to easily gather, view and manage critical voyage information - such as weather data, tidal information and digital publications - in one place for the first time. The Norwegian headquartered business supplies ENC-based services for a broad range of global shipping firms, serving its global customer base from offices in Singapore, Japan, Sweden, Russia, USA and the UK.
Weathernews Inc. is the world's largest private weather service company headquartered in Japan. It is the only global weather content maker that employs over 900 staff (including more than 400 meteorologists) in offices in 40 cities in 15 countries and region, including United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Netherlands, France, Denmark, China, Japan, Korea, Philippines, Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan. It offers a full range of weather content using "man-machine shareware system". In November 2003, Weathernews became the first weather service company ever listed in the 1st Section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange (4825).