Wouter Deknopper, vice president and general manager, maritime business, Iridium, told Seatrade Maritime News at SMM 2016 that the company has been gaining “good traction in the market” with increased sales and usage rates.
“Our results showed that we continue to grow despite the difficult business climate, thanks to our flexibility in pricings and our high value proposition,” Deknopper said.
Iridium Pilot, powered by Iridium OpenPort, the company’s current global broadband service, is one of the fastest growing maritime products in the Mobile Satellite Service (MSS) industry today.
Over the same 12-month period, Iridium OpenPort subscriber base increased by 9% across the company’s vast partner network and customer base.
The wide network is supported by Iridium’s partnership with Marlink Sealink VSAT, which when combined with MSS offer a broader range of connectivity solutions for shipowners to choose from.
“The strong performance of Iridium Pilot, combined with Iridium’s progress towards achieving certification to provide Global Maritime Distress and Safety System (GMDSS) communications, and the next-generation broadband service, Iridium Certus, on the horizon, demonstrates that Iridium is poised to take the lead in one of the fastest growing verticals in the satellite industry,” said Deknopper.
Iridium is now working with the IMO and its partners to materialise the GMDSS certification. “By 2020 we should see GMDSS Iridium based servers in the market,” he said.
Deknopper added that the company is confident of expanding its market share with the upcoming Iridium Certus, an advanced new multi-service platform powered by the $3bn Iridium NEXT, the next-generation satellite constellation. The Iridium Certus has a range of speeds up to 1.4Mbps and is designed to support a full range of versatile applications for any market, all built on a single platform.
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