October 2012 – "Data control" – Breakbulk Magazine - Softship.com

Arctic Breeze ■ Metal Fatigue ■ Buried Treasure ■ Road Worrier
SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER
2012

CONTENTS
20 TRADE NOTES
ILLEGAL PROCEDURE
U.S. export control reform
nears goal line.
26 RENEWABLES
ARCTIC BREEZE
Alaskan turbines roll with tides.
10 BREAKING THE
BOILERPLATE
Logistics, roles,capacity
change contracting landscape.
32 SPECIAL REPORT
MONGOLIA’S BURIED
TREASURE
Mining boom creates growth,
logistics problems.
44 CARRIER PROFILE
THE NEW
INTERMARINE
Scan-Trans merger is about growth.
54 LOGISTICS
MISSION CONTROL
Moving shuttle trainer is giant leap
for museum.
8 Editorial ■ 50 Opinion: Against the Wind ■ 65 Insurance: The Importance of Surveys ■ 74 Opinion: Best Supporting Actor
84 Opinion: Tea and Sympathy ■ 96 Opinion: Data Control ■ 97 Breakbulk Index ■ 117 Opinion: Intelligent Logistics ■ 126 True North
4 BREAKBULK MAGAZINE www.breakbulk.com
COVER STORY
SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2012

CONTENTS
60 PROJECT CARGO
CASE STUDY
REFINING
RELATIONS
Complex cargo move carves path
through Iraq.
76 LEGISLATION
ROAD TO
NOWHERE
MAP-21 provides little direction
for U.S. transport policy.
80 REGIONAL VIEW
EAST AFRICAN
EL DORADO
Infrastructure challenges
will complicate the quest.
68 METAL FATIGUE
Australia’s fading
aluminum fortunes.
86 RULES AND REGULATIONS
ROAD WORRIER
India’s red tape snarls
project cargo moves.
92 PORT NEWS
FOLLOW THE
MARKET
Benelux ports set foreign stakes.
120 PORT FOCUS:
BROWNSVILLE
HEATS UP
Steel helps Gulf port forge
recovery.
6 BREAKBULK MAGAZINE www.breakbulk.com
COVER STORY
CARGO LENS
SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2012

By Lars Fischer
OPINION O
DATA CONTROL
Breakbulk software streamlines carrier operations
As the voyage
progresses and actual
costs become known,
real-time updates
allow profi tability to be
monitored throughout
the voyage.
96 BREAKBULK MAGAZINE www.breakbulk.com
The general economic squeeze,
coupled with continually
increasing competition, means
breakbulk carriers must seek
effi ciency gains and cost savings wherever
they can.
Modern information technology systems
and software applications, when
used intelligently, can help deliver these
benefi ts. But care must be taken to select
applications specifi cally tailored to the
breakbulk sector. Many mistakenly choose
container-oriented software that simply is
not up to the job.
It’s not always easy to see how costs
can be cut within a breakbulk operation.
But savvy industry members are harnessing
advances in software technology to
automate many of their internal, resourceheavy
administrative processes.
Modern shipping software is modular,
meaning operators can select only the
applications they need to automate certain
processes within their businesses. Each
module seamlessly integrates with others
to facilitate a fl ow of information across
the company.
Data need only be input once, thus
reducing duplication, errors and confusion.
Data is then shared across the company
and with relevant business partners. This
signifi cantly reduces the administrative
burden and introduces effi ciencies across
the business. It also frees up staff to focus
on more customer-oriented tasks.
A good software suite will connect
and integrate all activities, from sales to
customer service to documentation and
invoicing. Many companies still duplicate
their efforts in these areas, which is both
ineffi cient and likely to introduce errors.
Implementing intelligent solutions will
streamline these processes and introduce
higher levels of accuracy.
Breakbulk-specifi c software can also
bring much-needed visibility and transparency
to a range of daily operations,
such as the common problem of calculating
the profi tability of a cargo booking.
A well-thought-out software application
will retrieve variable costs per shipment
from a cost database and apply these as
estimated costs to the booking. Information
on volumes taken from the customer
at the time of booking are automatically
married with this data to provide analysis
and profi tability assessments for each consignment.
And, as the voyage progresses
and actual costs become known, real-time
updates allow profi tability to be monitored
throughout the voyage.
Automating these processes enables a
huge amount of data to be captured, shared
and reused throughout the company. It can
also be analyzed in management reports.
Such business-wide transparency allows
busy executives to understand which areas
of their business are profi table and which
require more focus.
Good breakbulk-oriented software will
also manage and monitor voyage progress
and port call activities. Schedules can
be monitored and updated from arrival,
departure and noon-reports automatically
received from the vessel. Changes caused
by unforeseen events can be simulated to
provide estimates of the potential impact
on the overall schedule. The operator
can then simulate the most appropriate
countermeasures (such as speed orders).
Statistics provide transparency in terms of
port performance and help analyze important
key voyage performance indicators.
In a world where the customer is king,
clients expect real-time, up-to-date information
delivered directly to a platform of their
choice. Modern internal software applications
link seamlessly with browser-based
solutions to deliver this easily and without
fuss. Online bookings, bills of lading, cargo
documentation and cargo tracking can all be
delivered to a customer through a branded
Web portal, giving the operator a muchneeded
edge over competitors.
Good breakbulk-oriented software can
solve many daily headaches. And, in an
era of struggling markets and increasing
competition, installing intelligent software
could deliver a much-needed advantage to
a breakbulk carrier. BB
Lars Fischer is managing director of Softship Data
Processing, a subsidiary of Softship AG. He can be
reached at fi scher@softship.com.
SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2012