VSAT is often promoted as the perfect solution for maritime broadband communication.
First of all, I agree with this: For a ship owner it's undeniably important to stay in permanent contact with the vessel(s), while for the officers, the crew and even the vessel itself a good and permanent connection to the internet is mandatory nowadays. It's no longer luxury, it's a necessity that will only get a bigger role in the near future.
What I disagree with, is the fact that many providers offer services that are below any reasonable level of performance. Maritime connectivity is often sold in horrible agreements and to my modest opinion these contracts should be forbidden and the people that write or sell these contracts should seek another job, today. I know it’s an outspoken opinion but experience from all my years in the maritime industry tought me that the ship owners are not getting what they are paying for.
Let’s face it: An internet connection is invisible, it’s a bunch of radio waves that come from somewhere and go to somewhere and to top it all up it’s also affected by atmospheric conditions, twice. These atmospheric conditions are not just in the area of the vessel, but are also affecting in the area of the satellite ground station.
Perhaps you recognize the situation where the crew experiences a connection performance problem and they contact the NOC of your internet provider. Often -after some checks- the connection works better again: This should tell you that the bandwidth to or from the vessel was throttled down by the NOC and now it’s reverted to a normal level. Nothing else changed; the number of users on board are the same, the number of computers are the same, the ship didn’t suddenly enter or leave the Bermuda Triangle, nothing like that. Keep in mind that it was most likely intentionally throttled down because the capacity was also sold to other vessels in the same beam. It’s not uncommon that connections are shared between multiple vessels, but this is something you know when you sign the contract, the shared ratio is something you agree on. This level of performance however, should stay the way it is during the duration of the contract and not only get back to agreed levels after you start complaining.
Clever salespeople have promised you before signing their contract a normal bandwidth and a minimum bandwidth, but what they didn’t tell you is that it’s most likely that you will always work on the minimum bandwidth, or below. When you complain, they will tell you all kinds of reasons why it’s your fault and not theirs. They know you don’t have specialized IT professionals at that moment onboard, and they know that you cannot replicate the situation that you complain about as a proof, because conditions tend to change. They will also blame your old VSAT antenna because they don’t know the brand or -if they do- it’s because it’s just old. Or the modem, or the cabling, or your pc’s, or your network, or even better: the combination of all of this.
We like to put this to an end.
VSAT is not rocket science, although it comes very close. Computers and networking are not rocket science either, but many people think they know it all and overlook commonly made mistakes. The truth is somewhere in the middle.
VSAT technology can offer you a good and stable connection if you apply the right antenna hardware. The antenna should be installed optimal and maintained correctly and the network infrastructure should be well build. Below picture shows how it's correctly done. When you also work with
NOC’s that deliver what you agreed upon and which take
care for optimizing the traffic the way you need it, you will have a very
cost effective and satisfying solution on hand. Combined
with backup connections that automatically take over whenever the main connection get interrupted
you're good under any circumstance.
There are absolutely satellite providers that do fulfill their obligation to supply what you signed up for, but there are definitely satellite providers that will play with you and earn money by not giving what you bought. Due to our experience we know a few providers that we can recommend, and we also know a few that we will not recommend. I will not put their names here but as a rule of thumb I can tell you: If an offer seems too good to be true, it’s most likely not true.
We reduced our shortlist of good providers to 4. Contact us if you want to work with one of these.
We supply everything our customers need for VSAT communications and TVRO systems, to every corner of the globe. Looking for connections, system installs, hardware or repairs? Well, clear the decks – you’ve found the solution! 