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TOGETHERWITH STOLT EXPANDING BASSnet

As BASS continues to build upon its already impressive customer list, the company has hired a number of key personnel in recent months to help it reach even greater heights.

BASS IS EXPANDING

BASS had a strong presence at the AsiaPacific Maritime (APM) maritime convention in Singapore in March and Sea Japan in April.

STAyING CONNECTED

news @ BASSnet2.2010

Even the best fleet management softwareon the market is of little benefit to shipowners and ship managers if it isn’t installed seamlessly.

NiMic SHIP MANAGEMENT

May 20102

Trends driving innovative & intuitive solutions The only constant is change, and the maritime industry is no exception to this adage. When fleet management software was in its infancy, individual software solutions served their purpose for ship-owners and ship managers. Indeed, they were a vast improvement on what existed before them – which was, well, nothing.

But while they were the only option previ-ously, it’s a new reality now. And as competi-tion in the industry gets tougher, and as profit margins are slimmed, then a patchwork of software solutions – some companies have as many as seven different software vendors for various areas – isn’t sufficient for current, let alone future, needs. A “software soup” creates “islands of information” in shipping organisations, hindering cross-functional/cross-department interaction and a holistic view of managing ships.

Many of these patchwork solutions were acquired merely to comply with regulations, but now forward-looking companies have higher goals for fleet management software. They are keen to improve decision mak-ing throughout their operations and achieve greater transparency – both for their internal review, follow up, reporting, and business improvement – as well as for reporting to external parties and stakeholders.

Leading chemical tanker company Stolt Tankers is a prime example in this regard. Not only have they recently signed a contract for the supply, installation and support of BASSnet suites on 76 vessels and 4 satellite offices, but they’ve also entered into a joint development partnership with us in order to try and help make our maritime software even more intuitive than it is now. Find out more about this partnership on pages 2-4 of this edition of news@bassnet.

More automated processes, less administra-tive work, compliance, and a better under-standing of how the entire fleet is run – this is BASS’ offering to customers. And, more and more, we note that leading global shipowners and ship managers like what they see.

The contract with Stolt Tankers for the sup-ply, installation and support of integrated BASSnet™ Fleet Management Systems on 76 vessels and 4 satellite offices not only sig-nals one of BASS’ largest-ever deals but also a special relationship. The two sides are both investing time and money in a joint develop-ment partnership to expand and enhance BASSnet so that it will provide even greater benefits to Stolt Tankers and other BASS customers.

news@BASSnet recently spoke with the business architect heading up the customer side – Stolt Tankers Global Manager Jose Milhazes – to take a closer look at what this cooperation entails… Can you give a brief overview of where things stand at present?While this is the fourth maritime software in-stallation project I’ve worked on in my career, this is the first time that I’ve installed BASSnet. Stolt Tankers has tested two versions of BASS-net so far – versions 2.5 and 2.6 – and both the testers and I are happy with the products. While our implementation is still at a preliminary stage, so far we view BASSnet as quite easy to learn and use. Many of the processes that are already built into BASSnet capture what we want to do.

The deal with BASS has been talked about by both sides as “more than a regular contract”. How would you describe your agreement with them? That’s right. We haven’t just signed a contract with BASS – we’ve entered into a joint devel-opment partnership. We feel that both sides serve to gain here. Over the last three months we’ve had a number of discussions involv-ing the relevant Stolt departments and BASS developers and project managers. From our side, we’ve seen that what we have at present doesn’t fill all of our needs. We want to change, and we’re looking into how to do it. This can

be difficult because most people fear change, but we are convinced that it will be worth the effort in the end.

One thing we’ve been talking about with BASS in hopes of creating some software alignment is to integrate process mapping. BASS has had a very open mind about the entire process, and they see that they can do something with this, so we’re now at this phase.

There are about 200 standard processes for any shipowner – a great deal of these have to do with compliance. One of our goals is to auto-mate a number of these processes so that we can deal more with the exceptions rather that the standard processes on a daily basis.

We’re looking for software to be even more intuitive. Take spare parts – we’re hoping to get to a point where we can control the stock levels on ships. At present, we have systems that should theoretically provide control, but in reality we haven’t achieved it. We’d like the software to actively support the ship managers and ship crew in keeping the stock/inventory updated. How we’ll get here is still something of a brainstorm between Stolt Tankers users and BASS itself.

But this is just one part of the whole. We’re also looking on the crewing, safety and vetting sides, and even on the project levels. We want to be able to capture data that shows if we’ve improved from a given date to a given date.

Enhancing andexpanding BASSnet– together with Stolt

Cover story

BASSnet™ Modules• Maintenance

• Procurement• Operations

• Document management• Safety management (SAFIR)

• Risk management• Self assessment (TMSA)

• Crew/HR management• Report Generator

• Accounting• Payroll

Per Steinar UpsakerManaging Director and CEO, BASS

Jose Milhazes Global Manager, Stolt Tankers

May 2010 3

There are a lot of requests that we have for BASS, and BASS is trying to model these in their software.

How are you working at present in order to get to where you’d like to go in the future? We have users developing operating environ-ments with BASSnet 2.6 right now. That’s the first goal. The next goal is high-level process agreements with BASS and we just had the go-ahead for these now. After the data is devel-oped, there will be user acceptance so that we can see that the software can actually deliver what we need. These changes will take place in versions 2.7 and 2.8.

The idea then is to bring in approximately 4 vessels, along with users onshore, which will test the software for about 2–3 months. The vessels will carry out their regular jobs, but will also perform software tasks – like capturing navigational logs, maintenance and spare part information. Then we will see if we are able to accomplish what we intend to.

What we’re looking to do is to set up service-oriented architecture software, which we believe we will profit from in the long-term operations of our fleet. For example, in order to set up and manage crew competence properly, we have to enter some background informa-tion on the crew into BASSnet beforehand and continue to follow that up. After one or two years, we expect to have a system that will help us gauge and manage the competence of each crew member – and relate this to the perform-ance of each ship and the fleet as a whole. We will measure fleet performance in various areas like safety, vetting, technical condition, voyage performance and costs – and then look at what we should do in HR and crew management to improve our performance over time.

This is the type of information that we’re looking forward to capturing for version 2.7, along with fuel consumption and environmental data. We need to start collecting this data before we’re able to create a system that can be proactive and help us intuitively. Once we have this data in a database then we, together with the BASS team, can track it and use it how we need to.

The end goal is a more push-oriented, intuitive maritime software system with real-time data for those both on and offshore to provide the vessel’s full picture. We’ll then be able to build performance indicators from which (K)PI’s can stem afterwards.

So you’re not only looking to develop a system that better fits Stolt Tankers’ needs, but you’re essentially an active partner in developing a next-generation maritime software system.We are trying to accomplish that, yes. We see that BASS shares this vision as well. The software will help us find out where we need to look and push us to take actions to improve ship performance, environmental performance and energy performance.

For the development of the next version of BASSnet, we’re taking a share of the costs. We can help supply information on the practical knowledge side, and BASS provides develop-ment expertise and the BASSnet suite. BASS can sell this in the market later on, so this is also advantageous for them. Where do things stand with rollout plans? We’ve just finished the specifications, which we’ve been discussing for quite awhile. I went to Kuala Lumpur recently to speak with BASS in this regard. We expect BASS to deliver version 2.7 by the third quarter of 2010, which should meet all of the new software require-

ments developed in concert with them. We’ll then run User Acceptance Testing in October and then hope to rollout the new version at the end of 2010. We’ve also been discussing with BASS how to rollout on close to 80 vessels in a compressed timeframe. We are building a joint rollout team together with BASS and hope to have the product installed on all vessels in six months time afterwards – in the spring of 2011.

Given the fact that Stolt Tankers had ap-proximately 30 disparate systems on its vessels before its purchase of the integrated BASSnet suite, data migration to BASSnet must be quite a project. How is this coming along? We’re going step by step. BASS will support our data migration from our current mainte-nance and spare part systems to the BASSnet system. For some of these systems – includ-ing the crewing – we’ll use this chance to go through and clean up the data that we have at present and only transfer the relevant material. There are other issues regarding inspection re-ports, safety issues and safety data where we’re still deciding how we’ll go ahead and migrate it, if we will migrate it at all. It only makes sense for us to move the data if there’s a clear benefit afterwards.

And where do things stand with BASSnet training? The training will be broken down into three parts. The first part will be technical – teaching about areas including what a database is, what .NET is, etc. Then we’ll have BASS train the super users both onshore and on the vessels, which also covers all of the potential that the software includes. Finally, the training will go down to the personnel level.

We have a process-oriented view of the system, so we only want to carry out training of the

A TEndEr To rEmEmBEr

• StoltTankerswasinthemarketforafullyintegratedfleetmanagementsystemforitsentirefleetandoffices,andcarriedoutasix-monthtenderprocesswhichinvolved12differentsoftwarevendorsintotal

• Theinitiallistof12vendorswasthencutinhalf,withtheremainingsixsuppliersinvitedtoshowhowtheirsystemswouldcopeinlinewithalistof800explicitStoltrequirements

• Thegroupwasthencutinhalfyetagain–fromsixdowntothreevendors.Theremainingthreevendorswereinvolvedinatwo-dayworkshopinRotterdamwhichincludedin-depthpresentationsofthecompletesolutions

• BASSwasnamedthewinnerofthecontractduetoclosemappingtodesiredfunctionality,superiortechnologicalplatformandintuitiveuserinterface,andisnowcarryingoutthesupply,installationandsupportofintegratedBASSnet™FleetManagementSystemson76StoltTankervesselsandfouroffices

May 2010 43

www.say.biz

modules/processes that are relevant for each individual. We’ll then be able to put together BASS training checklists for each person based on what their role is in the company.

The feedback we’ve gotten from ship crew that have gone through this so far is very positive. Not only has the package simplified training, but it’s also simplified the seafarers’ learning process as well. Can you go more into detail about what types of benefits Stolt Tankers hopes to gain through BASSnet? We’re hoping to standardise our processes, which will provide us with a competitive advantage. By gaining a service-oriented database, we will have all of the data that we need to support our decisions and support our compliance in one place. As maintenance and repair are connected with safety and vetting, there are a lot of connections that need to be shared. This is also the case on the crew side. If you have an accident, links with crew training and performance will help bring root causes linked to human factors to the forefront. We expect that the benefits of having extensive linkages will be enormous.

By definition ship management is about manag-ing ships, but they’re not in a single place. You have all of these people – from engineers to navigators to maintenance people – travelling around the world. At present, it’s not possible to get a full picture of all the happenings on a ship in one single place. While it wasn’t intentional, the reality of many different programs running on our ships was that data was not useful. You were either blind (irrelevant or no data) or over-saturated (plenty of raw data but no distilled information pointing to a problem). The sys-tems didn’t allow the data to be shared in real

time. That won’t be the case anymore. When our safety department has a problem, then the software will be able to “push” this information to the superintendent to take action. You don’t need to send mails back and forth, or make lots of phone calls – everyone on ship or shore can see the same picture at the same time.

Also, by having a single system in place, we should be able to lower our maintenance costs, software licence costs, training costs and IT administration.

How much of what Stolt Tankers was look-ing for in its extensive search process for a new maritime software system was already in BASS systems, and how much of it wasn’t there as of yet but BASS was willing to work to try and add it in? We had a great deal of requirements and BASSnet satisfied a majority of them – provid-ing one of the most complete data models in the

maritime industry. We knew from beforehand that some of our requests and requirements wouldn’t be covered in a software system because we’d never seen them before. The truth is that BASS was quite open when they came to us in Rotterdam and demoed their product, highlighting the features and benefits. BASS was highly rated on the technical side from beforehand, and their openness was very important to everyone in our organisation that they demoed for. Not only their openness with what their product could –and could not – do at present, but also in their willingness to develop their product even further so that it could touch all of the bases that we were concerned with.

We’ve received quite a few calls from other po-tential BASS customers to find out how we’re working together, because it’s quite a different approach. It’s also nice for BASS to show its other customers what they’re doing.

JoSE milhAzES

CURRENT POSITIONStoltTankersGlobalManager

BACKGROUNDMarineEngineer

WORK EXPERIENCE BEFORE STOLT TANKERS •Soponata–MarenostrumShipManagement•GeneralMaritimeManagement

MARITIME SOFTWARE INSTALLATION PROJECT EXPERIENCE •Twoplanningmanagementsystems•Onecrewmanagementandpayrollsystem•Oneintegratedshipmanagementsuit•BASSnetshipmanagementsuite

May 20105

CustoMer Case

Even the best fleet management software on the market is of little benefit to shipowners and ship managers if it isn’t installed seam-lessly and staffers aren’t properly trained on how to use it. The ongoing rollout and implementation project with LNG ship man-agement company NiMiC Ship Management Co., Ltd (NiMiC SM) is a perfect case in point that BASS considers the initial signing of the contract merely the first step in a long and fruitful relationship for both parties.

NiMiC SM’s decision to streamline its business processes was instrumental in its purchase and plans to install BASSnet Accounting, Procure-ment, Maintenance and Document Manage-ment software modules at its office. “The BASSnet modules will serve as practical tools to help us carry out budget planning, store doc-ument, certificate and equipment maintenance information, and keep tabs on maintenance job schedules for safe, effective and efficient LNG transportation,” says NiMiC SM Deputy General Manager, Tsuginobu Miyahara.

TAILORED CONFIGURATIONBefore the configuration and implementation workshops kicked off towards the end of 2009, the BASS project team tailored the implemen-tation project and laid the framework for onsite scenario-based training to help users get the most out of the purchased BASSnet modules.

“After installing BASSnet modules onboard some vessels, our staff has taken advantage of the BASS-net module training, manuals and lab exercises. Staffers have become aware of the advantages the applications offer, and are leveraging their skills and shipping knowledge to manage most of the shipboard operations,” Miyahara says.

Implementation has been straightforward so far, with little data revision necessary. “All of the signs are positive, and we look forward to more deployment cooperation with NiMiC SM in the coming months,” says BASS Support and Service General Manager, Wong Nyuk

Lan. “We’re confident that BASSnet will help NiMiC SM improve operational processes, and that BASSnet’s technology platform will allow for the seamless addition of features and modules as the company expands or when it is in need of a more extensive solution.”

Getting the most out of BASSnet

BASSnetTM is a modular software that enables you to build one, integrated solution covering all main areas of

maritime operations. When modules are served by one central database you can enter data once and reuse it in one

process after the other.

A NiMiC-managed LNG tanker, with Mt. Fuji in the background.

May 2010 6

Mark Sundrum – Service and Support Manager Hired in November 2009, Sundrum has 10 years of experience as an engi-neer, commissioning superintendant and project manager with ShipNet, Kep-pelFELSSingapore, A.P. Moller Singapore and the Malaysian International Shipping Corporation.

Jack Chee Yong Luck – Service and Support Manager Jack Chee joined BASS in March 2010, and is currently responsible for sys-tems implementation, project consultation, customer services and support. He worked in the marine dredging industry since 2004 and was involved in crewing, vessel certifications, procurement, marine operations, maintenance and overseeing shipping agencies.

Captain Anil Kumar – Product ManagerKumar joined BASS in March 2010. He has nine years of experience in the maritime industry and previously served as a Senior Consultant with Frost & Sullivan Asia Pacific Transportation & Logistics Practice. He previ-ously held senior management positions with Torm Shipping India Ltd and the Bernard Schulte Ship Management group. His experience spans from competitive strategy development, safety assessment and voyage planning to ship maintenance, material management and inventory control.

Tan Chee Keong – Service & Support ManagerChee Keong joined BASS in January 2010 and is involved in service and support for after-sales and the internal IT department. Prior to joining BASS, Chee Keong served as System Integration Consultant and Marketing Manager for Malaysia software solutions and consulting company Leverage Solution.

BASS is expandingNeW eMPLoyees

BASS had a strong presence at the Asia Pacific Maritime (APM) maritime conven-tion in Singapore in March and Sea Japan in April. Company representatives carried out demos and showcased the latest product and service offerings to current and prospective customers at these events – two of the largest of their kind in Asia.

“A number of the shipping and offshore sup-port visitors to our stands are on the lookout for a genuine solution to fit their business operational needs. We’re optimistic about delivering quality solutions to these sectors, and our positive outlook for the future is also driven by signs of volume and rate recoveries in the global container shipping markets,” says Mark Ravi, BASS Head of Sales & Channel Management, Asia (pictured above).

At the Marine Electronics Conference held in conjunction with APM, Ravi gave a presenta-tion about “crew resistance towards IT” and provided the audience with ideas on how to in-crease crew retention through computer-based training programmes.

Given the strong interest in BASSnet Fleet Management Systems at both events this year from shipping and offshore companies in the region, BASS is confident that demand for its products will continue to grow throughout 2010.

Staying connected

aPM & sea JaPaN

Europe/Americas: BASS AS Lysaker Torg 8, P.O. Box 68, 1324 Lysaker, Norway • Tel: +47 67 10 55 20Asia/Pacific: BASS Sdn Bhd 19th Floor Menara Atlan • 161B Jalan Ampang • 50450 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia • Tel: +603 2173 6488 • Support tel: +603 2173 6422HQ: BASS Software Ltd. Atalanti House, 6th Floor • 203 Christodoulou Chatzipavlou • 3035 Limassol,Cypruscontact@bassnet.no • www.bassnet.no

UpcominG EvEnTS

PosidoniaDate:June7-11,2010Venue:HellenikonExhibitionCentre,AthensVisitBASSatstand719Formoreinformationaboutthisevent,visit:www.posidonia-events.com/online/content.asp?pid=51&mid=89

SMM HamburgDate:September7-10,2010Venue:InternationalTradeFair,HamburgVisitBASSatstand570(hallB6)Formoreinformationaboutthisevent,visit:www.hamburg-messe.de/smm/smm_en

BASS Customer ForumDate:October19–20,2010Venue:Singapore

Please visit www.bassnet.no for the latest details - BASS offices- BASS events or trade shows where BASS will appear

As BASS continues to build upon its already impressive customer list, the company has hired a number of key personnel in recent months to help it reach even greater heights.

The new hires are all exemplified by long industry experience –whether it be maritime, IT, or both. They include: