KVH Increases Data Speed for Workboats

KVH Industries, Inc. announced that its AgilePlans Regional solution designed for fishing vessels, workboats, and smaller commercial vessels now features data speeds as fast as 6 Mbps down/2 Mbps up and worldwide coverage providing vessels that typically work in regional waters with greater geographic flexibility.

AgilePlans Regional is a Connectivity as a Service (CaaS) subscription-based model that includes a choice of hardware (TracPhone V30, KVH’s newest and easiest-to-install ultra-compact system or the 37 cm TracPhone V3-HTS antenna with expanded network management), unlimited email and texting, installation in as many as 4,000 ports and locations, cybersecurity protection, KVH OneCare maintenance, and no commitment, all for one monthly fee.

“The challenges of the pandemic in the past year showed just how important reliable satellite communications are for working vessels and we are committed to ensuring that smaller commercial vessels have access to a solution that meets their needs,” says Mark Woodhead, KVH executive vice president for mobile connectivity. “The no-commitment, all-inclusive AgilePlans model is designed to help fleets upgrade their satcom with no upfront CAPEX costs, which might otherwise be a barrier.”

The AgilePlans Regional service complements KVH’s AgilePlans Global service, which is offered with the 60 cm TracPhone V7-HTS (with data speeds as high as 10/3 Mbps down/up) and the 1 meter TracPhone V11-HTS (with data speeds as high as 20/3 Mbps down/up), making AgilePlans available for commercial vessels of all sizes.

Throughout the maritime industry, commercial fleets are migrating from legacy L-band systems, where slower data speeds are measured in kilobits per second (Kbps) to VSAT services, such as KVH AgilePlans, where faster data speeds measured in megabits per second (Mbps) enable vessels to improve operational efficiency through digitalization. Vessel operators can use faster connectivity to take advantage of real-time data transfers to improve decision making for fuel optimization, route planning, and safety and to support cloud-based software programs, remote system monitoring, and data analytics.

KVH’s TracPhone HTS series antenna systems are designed for KVH’s mini-VSAT BroadbandSM HTS network, which provides global coverage from multi-layered high-throughput satellites (HTS) in the Intelsat FlexMaritime network with additional coverage from SKY Perfect JSAT.