Srt Marine Systems Share Discussion Threads

[lavalmy] 03/1/2019 12:21

Does anyone know how much the Bahrain contract is supposed to be? I have a vague memory of US$25 million but that was some time ago. They are supposed to be buying 10 Terma Radars as opposed to three which Siyadi had mentioned in 2017 - I would have thought that would put the value up unless they reduced other bits. Or they could have knocked SRT down on price, as Simon definitely said that margins would be lower on Radars. We shall see shortly no doubt.

[countryman5] 03/1/2019 09:35

Quote in Daily Telegraph from Tom Sharpe, a former Royal Naval officer and captain of HMS Endurance ‘I wouldn’t go to sea in any boat without AIS. Nobody looks out the window’

[lavalmy] 31/12/2018 06:49

The press release on the Ministry's site is here:



'His Excellency Interior Minister Lt-General Shaikh Rashid bin Abdullah Al Khalifa attended the conclusion of the naval exercise of the Coast Guard (the Vigilant Guard 7) on Sunday. Various directorates of the Interior Ministry took part in the event.
The exercise aimed to evaluate the preparedness, especially to protect maritime boundaries. HE the Interior Minister was briefed about the event and its scenarios and phases. He praised the efficiency of the Coast Guard and other participating forces and their cooperation in planning and implementing the event. He said the exercise represented the expertise and efforts to provide the Coast Guard with skilled manpower and hi-tech equipment and systems matching the international standards.
The Coast Guard Commander Major-General Ala’a Siyadi thanked HE the Interior Minister for patronising the final ceremony and for his continuous support to improve the capabilities of all departments of the Interior Ministry, including the Coast Guard. He also hailed the follow up of the Chief of Public Security, Major-General Tariq Al Hassan'

Looks more like a briefing than an exercise. Note on the right panel the Coast Guard message that I posted above.

Bright start to the New Year?

[yumyum] 31/12/2018 00:12

Thank you owenski. Maybe some official news on that then ? I am sure there will be a webcast in January.

[owenski] 30/12/2018 19:21

(Bahrain) Apparently a video extolling the success of the first two phases and how phase 3 completes the upgrade. (Forwarded courtesy of SRT)

[lavalmy] 28/12/2018 15:24

This seems to date from September/October from Bahrain



'The Coast Guard has implemented a comprehensive plan relating to the use of the state-of-the-art boats and equipment and developed a coastal radar system to help check smuggling, incidents of trespass and maritime piracy...'

I think they mean prepared a plan and presumably await sign-off.

[lavalmy] 28/12/2018 15:11

Just thinking that the last webcast was 5th October and he has been reasonably regular of late. He might be able to update us on this and other projects in the next one which should be soon, as well as the more oblique photographic nudges.

[lavalmy] 28/12/2018 14:05

I have been looking around a bit re the Vietnam situation and so far none of the various decrees and circulars have showed up. I have come across several bits and pieces that suggest a deal may not be signed until Q2 next year.

Firstly, a propos the boats >24 metres being fitted by April as mentioned in the article from Seafoodsource by YumYum.



helps clear up the confusion. 'The chairman has instructed relevant agencies and local administrations to remove Movimar satellite geo-positioning devices from fishing ships under 24m in length to transfer to vessels of 24m and longer.'

And this dated from the end of November says the same:



So it seems that the existing 3,000 units of CLS kit are to be at least partially redeployed to the largest vessels. I have seen various dates for that to have happened, most often January but also April. It also seems that the CLS kit was not always switched on and raises serious doubts about compliance with the relatively small number of vessels that are supposed to be covered by it. It would also seem very unlikely that the EU would even contemplate lifting the yellow card if all they have managed is to reshuffle the CLS kit.

This indicates what might be happening



'Deputy Prime Minister Trinh Dinh Dung has approved continued State funding to maintain the Movimar system pending the building of a scheme to carry out the second phase of the Movimar project.

He urged the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) to design the scheme quickly and submit it to Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc for approval in the second quarter of 2019.'

That suggests that they will carry on paying CLS for the 3,000 existing units until the new (and different) system is approved/installed.

This last article, though garbled, seems to indicate what the new scheme would be.



With Geofencing, smartphones, catch reporting etc, even CCTV, as well as the once every two hour reporting mentioned in the previous article (I am sure that CLS's system works better than that), it is beginning to look like an SRT system. Ca Mau province seem more switched on: 'the province is looking to install tracking chips on around 1,500 local fishing vessels that are 15 meters long or higher, out of the province’s fleet of 4,500 boats.' I would not relish the prospect of doing the installations throughout the whole country, even with the vocal backing of the P.M., so good luck to Simon with that.

My best guess is that SRT will installing the new kit on the bigger boats which will be tracked initially by satellite, similar to the first 1,000 Philippine boats, with the bluetooth, smartphone catch reporting etc, whilst the shore based infrastructure is being installed. The >15 metre boats next, increasingly monitored by the shore based base stations, and so on. As I say, it will not be plain sailing.

[goodapple] 28/12/2018 13:39

"Automatic Identification Systems (AIS) are causing problems for mariners transiting waters where there are high concentrations of fishing vessels, particularly in the East China Sea. The issue is not the fault of the AIS but the inappropriate use of the technology. Local fisherman discovered that by putting AIS transponders on their fishing nets, large ships would change course for the nets, thinking they were vessels. Fishermen have even been so bold as to contact the ships on the VHF radio and tell the bridge watch team what course they should steer in order to avoid the fishing nets."

[goodapple] 28/12/2018 12:37

Check out gCaptain.com today. Interesting article on fishermen abusing AtoNs (cheap ones, not SRT)

[lavalmy] 26/12/2018 13:01

A well though through and expressed post Owenski.

I think a lot of things have changed both with MDM/AIS and SRT's business over the years, often in tandem, often a result of SRT's actions or at least them foreseeing how things might develop.

If we assume that the difference between a mandate and a project is essentially who pays for the transponders, then we can look at the original introduction of AIS and LRIT by the IMO. The first was a true mandate in that all SOLAS vessels had to purchase at their own cost CLASS A transponders. It was, after all, designed primarily to avoid collisions between large vessels and the main beneficiaries of that would be vessel owners themselves. The broadcasts being intended to be received by nearby ships had also to be open and not private.

The second LRIT requirement deliberately used equipment already on board the SOLAS ships, at no extra cost to them, and was to be a private location tracking mechanism between the vessel owner and the flag state. Once in the hands of the flag state, the information is disseminated in accordance with very specific rules to other countries when it is required by the agreement and demanded by a participating state. So a closed system with limited data exchange. VMS for fishing boats, though not required by the IMO, is similarly private. This is an excellent link about LRIT:



The main shift that has happened since I have been an SRT shareholder is that it now looks that the open AIS system is being turned into a closed, encrypted, private mechanism for states to monitor their own boats for fishing or security reasons with the possibility of limited data exchange with others. AIS, or Class B AIS, is becoming VMS and/or vessel tracking. On the mandate versus project front, it is no longer a question of buying a transponder. The state now has to install the infrastructure to receive the signals and it is for their benefit. The transponders also have to be of a specific type and not openly bought on the market. It remains to be seen how the Philippines will recoup some of the costs, and I think it is also a question in Vietnam. Broadly, what once were considered mandates have become projects, including in India.

The second shift, as SRT have been working with the various governments over the years, has been a realisation that, given that collision avoidance between two vessels close to each other is no longer the purpose but rather surveillance, they need to be able to use all the new data effectively. That entails narrowing down behaviour patterns so as only to act on those few potentially worrying ones or being able to look at a vessel's history to see if it has been up to something. This is where the GEOVS comes in with all the analytics. And that allows for SRT's expansion into the adjacent non-AIS data sources to be fused intelligently. All this is very much at the project end of things.

God only knows what sort of system the Indian's are envisaging but that too is pretty much in the project bucket, even if they are trying to do it themslves.

So the overall shift has been from simply fitting transponders as a mandate to becoming national projects for VMS and tracking all vessels with the requisite intelligence, which in turn has expanded the scope of these projects to include amd integrate other data streams. The names of the countries haven't changed much. Yes the US did its very limited mandate and India is going its own merry way, but the rest are still very much in the mix.

[owenski] 26/12/2018 08:35

Good finds LaV

SRT made an interesting comment about transceivers in that to some extent they were becoming commoditised. To that extent chasing large orders at the expense of sacrificing margins just to get the business is not desirable.

I do think SRT with its core sales - that are now a one stop shop for all things AIS -makes for an attractive base and the growth appears to be there in this business sector, but they were never going to get every mandate out there - and good job too - some procurements are done on penny pinching tenders and are not worth chasing. I think SRT are acting prudently in what they do. The MDM style projects are the way to go as it's a package being sold which ensures a sales route for SRT's home made kit plus attractive overall margin.

Reading between the lines, it seems India wants to do as much as it can in house, their ethos being - 'made in India'. I wrote an - India identifier mandate - out of my personal equation some time ago, you just get a feel for when things aint gonna happen.

Having said that, my experience of government contracts is usually headline fanfare, followed by various mixtures of showcase successes along with swept under the carpet failures and cost over runs and back door changes. Budget priced equipment tends to give budget priced performance. As said, successful operation of a trial project will be different to a full roll out, that's when specification and design starts to show its worth.

Whether India still utilises some SRT kit at some point remains to be seem, but I'm not holding my breath. All of these mandates turned out to be a bit of a damp squib, compared to the projects business which is looking to be a shrewd tactical move by SRT, proof of which is just starting, a few more coming through the door here will start to put the company on the radar.

In summary, waiting around for SRT to score on some large national mandate didn't turn out to be the thing investors expected, but it looks like the project business is the sector that is going to bring home the bacon, anything else that adds to the mix is of course welcome.

But what do I know, I'm just the owner of a pot of jam.

Best wishes for the new year fellow punters.

[lavalmy] 25/12/2018 17:01

Looks like they haven't got anything at all:



That will get C5's blood pressure up.

' In a joint statement, ISRO and CNES stated they would work together for design and development of joint products and techniques, including those involving Automatic Identification System (AIS), to monitor and protect assets in land and sea. In particular, both sides will pursue the study of a constellation of satellites for maritime surveillance' but 'it would take less than five years to launch the satellites'.

CNES is of course the parent company of CLS.

So with regard to what is actually happening in India, I suspect that ISRO developed the local AIS transponder, possibly having nicked some IP from exactEarth and/or SRT, but that it will mainly use the existing shore based AIS base stations, with some limited satellite functions for distress/search and rescue.

[lavalmy] 25/12/2018 16:42

India is allegedly going to start a roll-out:



Unfortunately, the site will not let me cut and paste paragraphs. The relevant part is at the end. He talks about a successful trial and national roll-out of AIS to 220,000 fishing boats. The trial was small scale and it is at the roll-out stage that problems of colliding messages might become apparent.

A pinch of salt with anything coming out of India is advisable. This optimist thinks they have already done 70%:



Pure fiction. Though they will be starting in states which border other countries waters as we expected. It probably won't work at scale via satellite because of the number of vessels. There had been talk of using India's new GPS type satellite constellation, but they are in geostationary/geosynchronous orbits, so about 40,000 km high rather than the more homely 400 km of the low earth orbit (leo) used for AIS receivers. I don't know if India has put up leo satellites of their own nor what they might have put on them. In December 2016, exactEarth contracted to provide India's navy with AIS tracking for three years, so they certainly didn't have that capability then.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if India had to come back to SRT in a couple of years to get it properly sorted out.

Expecting an early bright start to the New Year and wishing all here and at SRT a very happy one.

[yumyum] 23/12/2018 09:25

I fully agree, alter ego, and I second all your comments above.

[alter ego] 23/12/2018 08:43

My thanks to all those who help to make this board a mine of information and unselfishly share knowledge and clues as to what’s going on. I hope you all have a very good Christmas and a particularly prosperous 2019.

That sentiment includes everyone at SRT too.

[lavalmy] 22/12/2018 12:41

C5

CLS is probably very upset that its VMS business is under threat in those countries wanting to expand coverage to more and smaller vessels. The first world countries it services are not affected by that, nor is the LRIT business, both their own and that of others, despite the fact that LRIT should be obsolete by now as AIS can do the job and the precise same boats have to have both Class A AIS and LRIT. The reporting mechanisms and infrastructure of LRIT probably mean that it is here to stay. CLS does much more with its satellites than VMS and LRIT and that it where they are focussing. Though for a business with a turnover of €122 million, the loss of a contract worth €28 million over four years is not pleasant along with the prospect of further losses in similar countries to the same competitor. They have announced a large constellation of nano-satellites to compete in the Internet-of-things space, but things will probably have moved on by the time they have that ready. SRT are looking wise in forgoing their own system.

[countryman5] 22/12/2018 11:52

Lav.
If and when the bid comes there will be numerous interested parties . Flir (owner of Raymarine)and JRC both rely on SRT's OEM modules. CLS is probably very angry as it sees its satellite market threatened by SRT and Geovs. The question is at what price SRT's major shareholders swallow the cash.

[lavalmy] 22/12/2018 07:08

C5

Ardian (the new and exciting name for AXA Private Equity) took a 32% stake in CLS for €30 million in 2013 when they targeting a 100% increase in turnover by 2018 to €180 million from €90 mn. So there were touting themselves as high growth but were nevertheless valuing themselves at a meagre one time sales. The outcome has been more modest than their lofty expectations - they hit €122 million in revenue in 2017 - and we know of at least one long-term contract that they are losing. So they have neither the money nor the growth story.

If at all, it will be someone else with deep pockets and/or a high p/e, like FLIR. Though I quite expect SRT to reach a respectable valuation on its own. And I don't see a third party noticing some hidden value that they can uncover that we haven't seen.

[countryman5] 21/12/2018 20:59

SRT Market cap £44 million

[alter ego] 21/12/2018 16:50

I'm beginning to suffer from acronymitis!

[owenski] 21/12/2018 16:49

The bifocal fisheries and agriculture - wearing glasses is obligatory in this unit. ;-)

[lavalmy] 21/12/2018 16:43

C5

Who in the blazes is BIFAR?

[countryman5] 21/12/2018 16:33

I suspect that a EU visit is due to BIFAR (It may have already happened). The EU will be aware of the CLS system and this will be a chance for them to be educated about the potential of AIS, including its much lower cost and the ability of Geovs to merge satellite, AIS (Land based signals) CCTV and radar. Clearly the ability of Geovs to merge all of the information and present the relevant information and alerts to the user should truly be educational for the EU officials. Will CLS try and buy SRT? They clearly have the firepower but would LAV etc be sellers? I am told that everybody has a price.