Daily Archives: 1. August 2012

* First of all this in not an endorsement for KVH. Not that there is anything wrong with KVH – but I wanted to clarify that I don’t have a working relationship with KVH. Readers should do their own evaluation of satellite system and service costs.  

* In my group: Marine Telecom (Communications) on LinkedIn, there is a new Discussion post:

http://www.linkedin.com/groups/Inmarsat-releases-confidential-pricing-data-3208547.S.140573555?view=&gid=3208547&type=member&item=140573555&trk=eml-anet_nwpst-b-cmt

Jim Dodez   1st (First level connection to me Alan Spicer on LinkedIn)
VP Marketing and Strategic Planning at KVH Industries, Inc.
Providence, Rhode Island Area

Inmarsat releases confidential pricing data – blog post
In an open letter to members of the International Chamber of Shipping, Inmarsat released for the first time detailed data about what maritime customers actually pay for their Inmarsat services, and how the majority of Inmarsat customers using Inmarsat Fleet and FleetBroadband services will pay more in coming months. This remarkable document is available through the blog of MSUA president Tim Farrar at the attached link (click reference to briefing paper). Forward this link to the person in your organization that manages your Inmarsat service!

Section 1.3 of the document outlines the average monthly cost of 50MB’s of data using each of Inmarsat’s services. This is Inmarsat’s own presentation from their own data of the real negotiated prices customers are paying, not the retail prices. Read it for yourself!

Inmarsat’s average cost of 50MB’s of data
Fleet 77 $1628 ($32.56/MB)
Inmarsat B $ 992 ($19.84/MB)
Inmarsat B HSD $ 620 ($12.40/MB)
Fleet MPDS $ 832 ($16.64/MB)
FleetBroadband $ 530 ($10.60/MB)

The letter provides remarkable revelations that should be carefully analyzed by all Inmarsat maritime customers, the overwhelming majority of who currently spend less than $1,000 per vessel per month and will be paying higher prices. When competition is driving prices DOWN, Inmarsat documents its decision to penalize existing customers that have made large investments buying, installing, and integrating Inmarsat equipment on their vessels by RAISING prices. Amazingly, Inmarsat presents the competiveness of their pricing based on the roaming charges of GSM service, not maritime VSAT services (see section 3.0 of their document)!

Inmarsat is addressing their profitability concerns, isn’t it about time you addressed yours? What’s going to happen when they launch their new Inmarsat I5 satellites and have the opportunity to raise prices/cut channel margins on FleetBroadband because of their profitability concerns following their huge investments in new satellites and lost revenues due to increased competition from new VSAT services providing full ocean coverage?

You can upgrade to faster, lower latency, global VSAT service rather than be held hostage by Inmarsat. For example, the price of 50MBs of data using KVH’s mini-VSAT Broadband service is $49, less than 1/10th the price of FleetBroadband and 1/30th the price of Fleet 77 (visit www.minivsat.com/one for details)!

Most customers upgrading their maritime connectivity with a priority of driving their own profitability (not that of their satellite service provider) are finding the best strategy is to keep their legacy Inmarsat service as a pay-as-you-use backup, and upgrade to maritime VSAT for the heavy lifting.

TMF Associates MSS blog tmfassociates.com

http://tmfassociates.com/blog/2012/07/25/moving-target/?goback=%2Egde_3208547_member_140573555
Its been a little hard to make sense of some of the data emerging from Inmarsat recently. For example, a recent factsheet from OnAir indicates that the first Global Xpress launch will be in October 2013, followed by

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Alan Spicer Marine Telecom and WiFiYacht.net

http://www.marinetelecom.net – http://www.wifiyacht.net

+1 954 683 3426

communications @ marinetelecom.net