Dataworks News

Sea Tel is pleased to announce that it has hired Mr. Chris Insall as the Manager, Commercial Programmes. Chris will be responsible for new business development. He will be based in the UK and will work from the Cobham Leatherhead office. Chris  will report to Peter Broadhurst, Director of Sales and Marketing. Insall has worked in the maritime satellite communications for over 15years and joins Sea Tel from Inmarsat, where he was the Maritime Product Manager. Since 2000, Insall worked at Inmarsat with roles encompassing Business and Product Management in areas including deployment of Inmarsat’s flagship Fleet and FleetBroadband product portfolios and integration of new value-added services such as safety, telemetry, and VoIP telephony.

Strategic Software has announced that StrategicIMX can now integrate all users of existing Strategic and Dataworks shipbroking software over the internet. A number of companies are already benefiting from IMX. US-based McQuilling Brokerage and Charles R. Weber are among the tanker brokers utilising the fully functional TankerIMX, a version specifically designed to cater for the tanker industry. E-Jan/DryBulkIMX, the IMX software for companies involved in dry bulk ocean transportation, is being used by NYK Line, Japanese shipbroker Yamamizu and other Japanese, European and US shipbrokers and shipowners.

A new and formidable player emerged in shipping's e-broking sector this week to challenge the previously undisputed market leader LevelSeas, which is still more than a month away from launching a product. Software provider Strategic said on Tuesday it had acquired its closest competitor Dataworks. Although market sources put the price tag at a relatively low one million pounds ($1.4 million), they said that with 600 customers and numerous products already launched Strategic would provide a strong challenge to LevelSeas. "Levelseas started from scratch," said a source at Strategic. LevelSeas was founded by Shell Cargill and London shipbroker Clarksons in April 2000 to broker ships for cargoes over the Internet.

A leading software supplier to the shipping industry said on Friday it had launched a new internet-based tool for the chartering and operation of tankers. It said the system had been developed with support from three U.S. ship brokerages: Dietze, McQuilling and Weber. Strategic Software, which acquired its closest competitor Dataworks in May, has long dominated the shipping sector. In the last two years it has come under increasing pressure from internet start-ups keen on taking a slice of the $120 billion per year maritime freight industry. The system is likely to compete with the online services of London's Baltic Exchange, which will be launched next Monday. To some extent it also competes with LSX-2, a product being developed for online ship chartering by London-based Levelseas.

John Rolfs, a founding director of shipping IT provider Dataworks, has returned to the maritime communications and technology sector after a two-year absence with his new company, Chipcraft. Rolfs left Dataworks in 2001 when it was acquired by Strategic Software. Chipcraft, his first venture back into the maritime sector, is a specialized software provider to the shipping world. Chipcraft is the official U.K. and Northern Europe representative for Danaos Shipping Software of Greece. As well as bringing communications and ship management software to match client needs, the company provides installation and support for its customers through U.K. partner and network specialists, Blue Diamond IT.