Singapore Rolls Out 'Maritime Digitalization Playbook'

The Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore (MPA), Singapore Shipping Association (SSA) and Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) have launched the Maritime Digitalization Playbook (MDP), to support maritime companies in accelerating their digitalization plans as the economy reboots and enters a new normal post-COVID-19.

Senior Minister of State for Transport and Health, Dr. Lam Pin Min, said, “This pandemic has accelerated digitalization, regardless whether you are a multinational company or a local SME. The Playbook will serve as a guide to help maritime companies uncover opportunities in digital transformation. Our hope is that no matter where you are in your digitalization journey, the Playbook will help support your vision and development of concrete digitalization plans to improve the competitiveness and productivity of your company.”

The MDP incorporates key findings from the IMDA-commissioned 2020 Digital Acceleration Index (DAI) survey for the sea transport sector, where more than 200 maritime organizations submitted a self-assessment of their digital maturity. This has enabled MPA to establish the state of digitalization of subsectors such as the shipping line, ship management, ship agency and harbour craft. To help maritime companies chart out their digitalization and innovation journey holistically, MPA partnered SSA and IMDA to develop the MDP as part of Sea Transport Industry Transformation Map efforts.

The MDP will help maritime companies, in particular small and medium enterprises, to formulate their digitalization roadmaps, guide execution and benefit from maritime digital platforms covering port clearances and services, trade documentation and trade operations and financing. This guide provides these companies with:

• An overview of the state of digitalization in the maritime sector based on results of the 2020 DAI survey;
• An understanding of the sector’s digitalization landscape and opportunities, including key global trends driving digitalization, examples of technology use-cases and the potential impact on planning, operations, commercial and support functions of a maritime business.
• A digital transformation framework to help identify digital driven business strategies and prioritize digitalization initiatives.  

The MDP supports Maritime Singapore’s broader efforts in digitalization. It complements the Sea Transport Industry Digital Plan launched in 2019. Companies can also apply for co-funding from MPA’s Maritime Cluster Fund – Productivity Development (MCF-PD) to develop their digitalization solutions.

The Maritime Digitalization Playbook is available for download at the MPA website.

“SSA initiated the co-development of the Maritime Digitalization Playbook with MPA and IMDA as both parties saw the need to provide a practical guide to help maritime companies develop or retool their digitalization capabilities to grapple with the fast-changing anomalous world. The MDP contains information and resources, that include templates and support programs, to help companies identify and address target gaps to formulate or rethink their digitalization strategy. We strongly encourage maritime companies, especially the small-medium enterprises (SMEs), to make use of the MDP to achieve their digitalization vision,” said Caroline Yang, President, SSA.

“The Maritime Digitalization Playbook helps maritime companies to understand the digital gaps in the industry and how they can use technologies to close these gaps.  The Playbook also includes the various government schemes to support the companies in their digitalization efforts.  Together with the Industry Digital Plans, which are part of the SMEs Go Digital program, these will give companies a wider range of potential solutions to adopt. Collectively, they will enable our maritime ecosystem to integrate with a rapidly evolving digital economy,” said Tan Kiat How, Chief Executive, IMDA.