Selling a service to shipping companies

Maritime Topics Maritime Security
1

I am trying to sell a security service to shipping companies. My problem is I can get guys like you to look at the website http://www.over-watch.co.uk and listen to my patter, because at the end of the day you guys are at the sharp end and most have welcomed the new idea.
My problem is trying to get hold of the right people to talk too at the shipping companies. No one will take the responsibility and hold there hand up and say ’ I deal with that, talk to me ‘.
Even maritime associations will not say ’ good idea’ or ‘bad idea’ not even a ‘maybe’. Not on paper anyway.
Anyone that has an e mail address that may help me out or if you know someone that you could pass the link onto, I would be very grateful.

Again thanks for your time guys.

2

Sorry John but i completely disagree with the concept that a Merlin can be commercially effective in this role.

I speak as pilot that has flown Pollution and Fisheries protection contracts and now speak as regular adviser to shippers in role of Piracy and Security.

If you had a BN Islander or Defender 4000 with an effective loiter time of 5-8 hrs at 55% power then you may be of use as a general broadcast service, however when i used to fly the CNIS aircraft in the Dover straights the speed of the vessels and high density of traffic, it was sometime very hard for anyone to pick up a speedboat on anyones radar with a crosssection of less than 1.5 mtrs…! Your ability to both integrate with the vessel and define between fisherman and pirates is not viable in the GoA.

Sorry, but unless you have a bucket load of Helicopter gunships at your disposal i very much doubt you will have much luck signing up shippers.

We offer Armed military embarked teams for $35,000 USD and Armed Naval Personal escort for $55,000 USD.

The merlin will cost not less than $2000 USD per hour to operate plus you have to position it down there…blah, blah, blah… for $20,000 USD per day no one is going to buy a service that can do nothing if one of those boats decides to come and have a pop at it!!

We are now seeing more and more attacks at night - so how are you going to ident friend or foe at night and fly 24hrs??

Great idea…not viable - sorry!

3

Hi Nick.

Sorry you disagree, but we will have to agree to disagree.
The Merlin was picked because it has a range of over 1400 nm, 2000nm ferry distance, as well as the price to buy them in the first place. The merlin has been used in it’s military design as a SLAR aircraft, 3 will be covering the GOA at anytime, 8 aircraft based in the GOA area at a time. I will leave you to do the maths of how much area each will have to cover.

I gave the spec for the radar to the radar people, who do the radar for the military and the coast guard and they came up with a system for me that will go out to 240 miles, won’t be able to pick up a skiff at that distance, but it gives you an Idea. They tell me it will spot a skiff at a fair distance.

To tell the difference between pirates and fisherman is a problem for everyone, but the camera system can read the name on a vessel at over a mile and seeing as it is a FLIR camera, night ops are not a problem. I doubt your hand held NVG’s will be able to see that far.

The cost of my service is not much different to yours, in fact we are cheaper on a journey through the GOA than you are. Just the way we structure the cost.

I am not saying your way is better than mine or mine better than yours, but the problems associated with having armed men on a vessel far outway having them there. The legal ramifacations of shooting a pirate in international waters, territorial waters, traveling in some territorial waters armed and the worse case senario, what happens if an RPG hits some thing you don’t want hit, like an oil or chemical tanker. What happens to the crew and your team if you loose. I have listened to all of the pro’s and con’s of un-armed and Armed for a long time and I am a firm believer having no security team or an un armed security team puts the vessel in less danger than having a armed one, as long as the crew is trained to deal with the problem.
The crew being warned a few hours ahead of time that there is a problem, giving them the time to change course, speed up and put the company policies into action and the naval or local authorities being told and having a look themselves, this puts the vessel in far less danger, than waiting for the first RPG to come sailing through the bulk head. It does not matter if your team wins or not, the damage could already have been done.

After 20 odd years of working in hostile areas of the world, mostly in armed conflict areas. I have found very few systems, ideas or plans that work 100% everytime. Some times the plan works because you happen to have just scrapped through by the skin of your teeth. Other times because you just happen to be better than the other guy.
As they say ’ different horses for different courses’.

I have had a lot of interest from shipping companies and the future will tell if my Merlins work or they don’t, seeing that 2 of them are surveillance aircraft anyway, we will see if they come up to scratch. But seeing that each aircraft, with it’s system cost nearly 4 million USD a piece, I think they will do fine.

I wish you good luck to you and your company.

Johnb
http://over-watch.co.uk