Vessel-fixing platform Sea has struck another strategic partnership designed to streamline its service.
The spin-off from shipbroker Clarksons said it will work with London’s Spot Ship to integrate its AI email parser solution into Sea and automate the vessel and cargo-matching process.
Spot Ship is built for brokers, charterers and operators, using machine learning to extract key market data points from emails automatically.
When the integration is complete, it will enable users to glean insights into vessel availability without going through a manual data exchange process, the company added.
“As well as reducing the administrative burden and creating a seamless experience for users, this partnership will, in turn, power better decisions to enable sustainable shipping,” Sea said.
The deal encompasses commercial availability of relevant vessels, fleet tracking and live market information.
The idea is to “cut through the noise” of countless market circulars to focus on only the most relevant developments, reducing duplication of information and enhancing competitiveness, Sea said.
The company believes the deal brings Sea an important step closer to digitising chartering workflows and pre-fixture documentation.
Chief executive Peter Schroder said: “Inboxes are overloaded with updates and communications when matching cargo to vessels, and hours are spent creating and maintaining intelligence lists to capture these insights.
“Through our collaboration with Spot Ship, we’re not just giving those hours back to our customers, we’re also equipping them with the tools they need to make data-driven decisions. Spot Ship has market-leading parser accuracy, which makes them the perfect partner for our work to digitise freight chartering workflows,” he added.
Deals with Marcura and Setapp
James Kellett, co-CEO at Spot Ship, said: “The automation of previously manual processes around vessel and cargo-matching will save precious hours, drive operational efficiencies, and deliver additional insights that can support market competitiveness for Sea’s customers as we sail together into the data age.”
Sea added to its reach in May with a deal to buy recap and charterparty management platform MarDocs from Marcura.
The London-based tech outfits also formed a new strategic partnership.
Sea said the moves would further accelerate its progress in digitising and managing chartering workflows from pre-fixture negotiation to documentation.
This was Sea’s third major acquisition since October 2022.
Last November, the platform secured more software development power by buying Polish maritime technology company Setapp, which has about 50 staff in Poznan.
This came after the takeover of Sweden’s Chinsay, merging the freight contract management platform’s services into Sea’s digital operations.
